Bailey’s Blog

Problem 1: Student is not timing their split step when making recovering steps after a fed ball hit 

Solution: Get the student to split step (nice and wide and with soft knees) when the ball passes the baseline at the other end of the court

Problem 2: The student is dumping the ball in the net when hitting from an open stance

Solution: Tell the student to “Let the ball the ball come to you” and “Feel the ball hit the strings before making the contact move” (this works well on 2 foot pivots, 1 foot pivots, moguls, lateral hops, low spins, power moves and reverse spins…see Q & A’s for more on each move) i.e. don’t perform the contact move too early from an open stance!

Problem 3: The student is lifting up with the legs when stepping down the court

Solution: Stay low through the the step down contact move.

1st: Finish the stroke before bringing the leg through for balance and power

2nd: Watch the ball bounce on the other side of the court while looking under the white tape at the top part of the net i.e. if you are looking over the net when the ball has bounced you have lifted the body up too high and straighten out the legs through contact, thus the result is a ball that is flying out beyond the baseline.

What are your feet? Turbo-charged pistons!

What are they going to do? Fire me around the court!

How fast can you move? As fast as a bullet!

How fast are they going to move? As fast as a bullet!

Then lets see them do it!

When you go through life you can be one of two things

You can be a LIFTER

or you can be a LEANER

A lifter is a person who puts in effort, who strives to overcome, to improve

A leaner puts in no effort, a leaner relies

If a leaner and lifter where partners and playing with a ball, and the ball stops in the middle and rolls down a hill, then the leaner says  “You can get it”!

The lifter, smiles, runs down the hill, picks up the ball and bounces it up the hill, happy to have the extra time to practice and better his skills.

The enemy of life is not failure, but lack of effort, lack of trying, lack of giving yourself the chance to be the very best at what you choose to do.

The mediocre teacher tells

The good teacher explains

The superior teacher demonstrates

The great teacher INSPIRES

If you want to be fit, take the attitude of the thorough breed horse trainers

They feed their horses the best grains

Groom their horse so the coat shines, till it looks unstoppable

Runs the horse on a soft track to prevent injuries, never the hard road

Exercises the horse everyday, but doesn’t over-train it so it’s performance becomes flat

Run it till the stride and balance are faultless

Why do they do this?

Because their livelihood depends on how their horse performs, a perfectly tuned horse means food on the table

If the horse trainer put the same commitment into their own health, saw their fitness as important as their horses, then wouldn’t they be

some of the fittest people around?

It is like a professional tennis player, their body is their temple, an injured and worn out, unfit body will never win you tournaments!  

Every step to the ball is important in tennis as it is in other sports. Look at the run up in cricket, long jump, high jump, javelin etc..if you miss judge the run the power and timing is lost.

But, in tennis do some steps have more importance or impact on a successful shot than others? I think so, and the 5 that I think should be trained and are very important are the split step, the first step, the penultimate step, the brake step and the recovery step.

The split stepis the step made as the opponent strikes the ball. It needs to be initiated when the opponent starts their forward swing because both feet need to hit the ground as the ball strikes the racket at the other end of the court. You don’t want to split too early or too late and the split step is crucial as it helps regain balance and load the legs so you can spring towards the ball. Try not to split the feet too narrow and make sure your feet “touch and go” i.e.  don’t lose the elastic properties of the muscles by staying in the split step for too long.

The first step should be onto the heel when taking less than 3 medium steps to the ball. Here you are not rushed to move, thus you want to keep the weight back with good body alignment and by moving with a heel strike first you will achieve this. If you need to take 1-2 large front crossing steps or running steps to the ball then you need to explode quickly to the ball. This is when you drop step (sometimes called a gravity step) the foot closest to the ball. This puts this outside foot onto the ball of the foot and enables you to drive out to the ball quickly, even though the inside foot does the initial push. By getting onto the ball of the foot you push your head outside your base thus it is important to regain your body alignment as you set up into your hitting stance. 

The penultimate step. If you go to the Thesaurus English UK version and punch in ‘penult’, you get a couple of definitions - it means “second last in a series of things” or “second last in a sequence of steps”. Thus, in short, the penultimate step is the step prior to striking the ball. The penultimate step is crucial in tennis. It is the step that will determine what type of stance you will hit from and where your weight is held before selecting your contact move. I like to think the last step is the contact move itself, be it a hop, pivot, lunge,shift, spin or transferring move. Most penultimate steps are wider than the previous step as the last step needs to wide in nature to help center the body. I sometimes call the penultimate step the “educated foot” or the “anchor step” because I believe it is this step that gives you the balance and loads the legs  with the correct % of weight distributed on the back, front or outside foot (depending on contact move used). The secret to power lies in balance and weight distribution so the penultimate step is where the strides are “checked” i.e. slowed down and the weight and body aligned for a good clean hit. Remember, you are only as good as your stance, and, if you fix you balance you fix your swing.

The brake step  needs to be practiced and is the step/s that stops the body after the contact move has been completed. Even though I have called them brake steps I like my clients to think they have completely finished their swing so this step feels more like a push to the next ball than falling onto or away from the braking leg. My favourite way of explaining this is to think like a swimmer and finish the tumble-turn before you push of the wall. A common error in tennis is to try and recover before the shot has been made and you get that classic “falling off the ball” during contact. This is where the weight transfers from the outside foot to the inside foot instead of the weight shifting beyond the ball.

Recovery step. This step really can vary and I like all my clients to have the skill to be able to push back, side-skip back, cross the outside foot in front, cross the outside foot behind, sprint forwards or laterally etc..The recovery step will depend on your court position, whether you are in defense or attacking mode and is really dictated by the quality of your shot or your opponents shot.

I really like to train all my clients to know where their feet are in space and have such good control of there feet that all options, be it footwork steps, stances or moves feel comfortable, natural and athletic. It is really important to develop tennis players but equally important to develop tennis athletes. So go out onto the court and allocate some time where you and think only about your feet when practicing. Feel what feels comfortable and then trust you training in match play. Tennis matches become a lot more fun when you know you have done the hard work  and put in the yards with educated practice. 

The blog below still didn’t publish properly so all I can suggest is copy the text and paste into a word document and cut the text under each title i.e 1st Getting ready, then cut and paste the corresponding letters underneath. The blog will then read easily. Sorry again. Dave

When I wrote this blog on July 8th 2009 the text did not publish properly ….SORRY ABOUT THAT!!!….below is the correct edited version

Professional Players all have one thing in common when returning serve. They have a set return of serve routine and use all the 5 R’s every time they PRACTICE THEIR return of serve.  The 5R’s are 5 progressive footwork techniques that you use when moving to and from every ball when playing tennis. I always list them as getting ready then reading then reacting then responding and finally recovering on the court. The 5 R’s slightly differ when hitting ground strokes, approach shots, serves, volleying and returning serves but the general 5 principles DO NOT.   Below is how the 5 R’s relate to the return of serve - 1^st Getting READY on the toes – A.)          Walk up in a confident and relaxed manner to their preferred returning position on the court B.)          Perform ready steps when the opponent is bouncing the ball in preparation for the serve

C.)         Get into a strong athletic position when the opponent has stopped bouncing the ball and is getting ready to serve  

2^nd READ the toss of the serve -  

D.)         Take a small step with the dominant foot (player preference) when the player STARTS the up phase of the ball toss 3^rd REACT with a split step   E.)          Split step when the player hits the ball and then adjust the feet (out steps) into the relevant hitting stance 4^th RESPOND with an offensive, rallying or defensive  contact move depending on the effectiveness of the opponents serve and the returning player’s mindset5^th RECOVER

F.)          Regain balance with a brake step (if needed) 

G.)         Followed with recovery steps to the MIDPOINT RECOVERY POSITION (this depends on where return landed i.e. cross court, down the line or middle of court)

Note: The depth of the midpoint recovery position will also depend on the effectiveness of the return i.e. are you inside, on or behind the baseline?  

I had the pleasure of spending 2 hours on skype with John Carpender a very passionate and knowledgeable coach from the USA who is Certification Director of a Tennis certification company called MTM (Modern Tennis Methodology) which is based on the teaching of Oscar Wegner (famous for his book “Tennis in 2 hrs” and his simply approach to learning tennis).

Johns ideas and Oscar teachings make a lot of sense especially because the ideas are based on years of research and careful observation of how the modern day professional  hit the ball. I particularly like the simple explanation of hitting a topspin forehand. What they call the 3 F’s.

Find the ball, Feeling it and finishing.

I used these 3 concepts in my lessons after speaking with John and they really helped as I am a big believer of cue words and using words that have real meaning in getting quick results with your students. I have adapted these 3 great words to movement and this is how I explained it:

1. Find the ball with out steps and a hitting stance THAT WORKS for the INDIVIDUAL PLAYER and the corresponding approaching ball
2. Feel the ball with the contact move and relevant balance move that feels comfortable and again WORKS  for the INDIVIDUAL player (I am a huge fan of experimenting with a variety of different moves that feel natural and  non restricting)
3. Finish the shot with out falling, reaching or jumping and even freeze the finish so you keep you balance and don’t rush your brake and recovery steps
4. Recover to the mid point recovery position of your opponents next shot…..make sure you check out Modern Tennis Methodolgy a lot of the ideas really make sense!!!