Transcription
Welcome back everybody. In this video, I'm going to explain how you can get a pro-level serve. So, this is one of the shots that has become a weapon in today's game. And if you're still somebody serving like it's 2020, 2021, just pushing the ball in, you're giving away an amazing opportunity to get ahead in the point.
If you hit a good deep serve with top spin and pace, your opponents are more likely to hit bad returns, miss returns, give you easy thirds. That's a huge advantage when you're losing games 11-5, 11-6, 11-7 in that range. Changing that serve will help you get in more, help you get more errors, and help you feel more comfortable in those close matches. So, today we're going to go over everything you need to develop a pro-level serve.
First thing we're going to talk about is a fundamental change to the way that you swing the paddle. So, the biggest problem I see is if your paddle is down like this and you're serving, you will never be able to hit an aggressive serve. That's because when you make contact with the ball, you are hitting directly up on the ball, right? Which means power translates to distance. And what I mean by this is the harder you swing, the deeper the ball goes, right? So, you may be able to hit it deep, but you're never going to be able to hit it fast because the faster you swing, the deeper it goes. So, the component we need to add is top spin. This is going to allow us to increase our power without making the ball go deeper.
So, the change we're going to make is instead of swinging this way, we're going to turn our paddle like this. Right? So, you can see this is what's called closing the paddle face. So, instead of having an open face where you can see it, I'm going to close it. This is a huge mechanical adjustment, not that challenging to do, but will make a big difference. This is also the same mechanic to generate top spin on your drives or swinging volleys, any other shot. But the serve is the easiest place to implement it. Now that we have a closed paddle face, that will allow us to swing super hard and get a lot of dip on the ball. Right now, I'm just going to kind of show you what I mean. So, first you're going to see me serve both ways. Then you're going to see where the balls are landing and what the difference is.
So first here is the serve that I see a lot of, which is a big issue. So without talking about any other mechanics, just that open closed face. You can see how with that open face I'm more pushing through and with the other closed face I'm swinging right. So now I'm going to show you where these balls are landing and you can see the difference in the serve. I'm not going to really change any of the other mechanics right now. That's pretty much it. I'm just going to go one or two, right? The closed face swinging through, the open face swinging through. So, here is the open face. [Applause] Now, if I swing harder, here's what happens. Right? So, swinging harder with that form doesn't get the ball to go in because it just goes deeper. Now, I'll close the face. [Applause] Now I'll swing harder with a closed face and you can see the difference. [Applause]
Thank you for coming back for another video. We're going to do a little series here on a lot of the basics. So you don't want to miss any of it, right? We're starting with a lot of these 30-35 concepts because I think we really have a lot of new viewers since I posted some of these videos six months ago. So, we're gonna kind of double down on the basics the next few weeks and really help you guys. So, make sure that you are subscribed and let me know in the comments other shots that you need to work on so you can see the difference. I'm going to explain to you why it is that way. Zack, ball me, baby.
So, with an open face, you are always going to hit under the ball because how could you hit with like this on top? That ball's never going over the net. With a closed face out on the side like I was, you can hit higher on the ball and generate spin. Now, what happens with a shot like that is these paddles, this didn't used to be possible, but they grab the ball. What this allows you to do is hit above the midpoint on the ball. I'm hitting about up here and the ball doesn't go straight down. Right? If you don't come from tennis like me, this idea of grabbing the ball is a little bit of a foreign concept. But if you try it out with that closed face, swinging through like I was talking about, you'll notice how the ball dips on the other side of the net. That is a huge change that will allow you to do what we call swinging out. It'll allow you over time to swing harder and harder with the ball just getting more spin and pace, not going out. So, these pros can hit their serves pretty much as hard as they can and get it to land right here. If you're hitting like this, you literally can't do that, no matter how good you are. That's why you'll never really see a pro serve this way, because the paddle is getting underneath the ball.
The second thing we're going to talk about is momentum. This is the second big thing that you could add to your serve to get more power and what we call linear momentum. This comes in a couple different ways, but it's always the same in that it's a weight transfer. So, there's a few ways to do this. So, what I was doing there, I did it a little bit, but I'm going to really emphasize it right now. So, I could serve like this, right? And that's all my arm, right? There's no core, there's no legs. It's just your arm. And some of you may be pretty strong and may be able to hit the ball pretty hard, but this muscle will always pale in comparison to these muscles, right? So you want to use your glutes, your oh your glutes, your hammies, all those big muscles at the bottom to produce that power. Also your core.
The way we do that is I do it. I like walking in. So when I serve, I go a baby step and a step. And that's the weight transfer, right? My weight goes from my right leg to my left leg, giving me all that leg power through. So before my arms are even involved, I have power, power, power, right? I'm not even using my arms and I'm producing all that power. Now, for a lot of you, that may be a little complicated. So, let's baby it down. So, what I did until recently was just a weight transfer. So, you can just do this. Start with your weight on your right kind of boom. So, you're just going to lean into it and serve. You're still going to get that weight transfer and you're going to be able to engage that core, right? So, the second part is when we transfer that weight, you can see how my core is turned this direction. When I follow through, my core turns that direction. So that turn engages my core and the step engages my legs.
You will notice a huge difference in what we call effortless power. And what that is is you don't really have to try to produce this power. You'll see players, one of the best examples is Chris Hayworth. He has what looks like an effortless swing, but hits the absolute beef out of the ball. And the way we can do that is using our keeping everything loose and together. So, if you can come through like this, you can hit the ball super hard without trying that hard, right? Anytime we can get more power and spin without forcing it is an easy upgrade to our game. So, I'm going to show that to you right now. Again, in slow-mo right now, I'm going to show you the two different ways. Just using my arm like this versus my core, and then you'll see what the ball looks like on those two different strokes.
So, first here's my arm. So, here's just a normal swing. And now I'll show you like two. I'll swing as hard as I can. But you'll notice without my body engaged, there's only so much power I can get. So, that's pretty much as hard as I can swing. First off, that's kind of hard. I'm like really trying. So, it's not very effortless. And the second thing is that is nothing compared to what I can do with my legs. So, now here's what a just a nice easy serve, not 100% is engaging my legs. So, that's about as effortless as it gets. And that's probably faster than any of the other ones. Now, if I crank it up a little bit and I swing it like like I would in like a big match, hopefully it would look more like this. So, right on the line, big serve, weight transfer. Fun, fun, fun.
Just for your reference, Zach and I just decided that I'm going to switch my serve to the single step actually because it's a little easier than the two steps I've been doing. And making this video just helped me change my form. So, I'm constantly tinkering and I'm encouraging you guys to do the same. So, quickly Richie recap here. Let's dive in. Right.
Two big things we talked about. The first one, and by far the most important for your serve, is changing your paddle face. Right? If you are an open paddle face player, there is a low ceiling on how good you can hit your serve. If you close the face, even if you're not that comfortable with it right now, your ceiling is as high as anyone's. That's the form that allows you to keep swinging out on the ball, getting top spin, pace, and depth, right? So, close that paddle face and work on that swing.
Now, the second thing is the momentum. You saw the difference. If I'm just using my arm, I can swing as hard as I can, but this is a small muscle. We want to introduce our big muscles and get a weight transfer, right? So, you want to take your weight from your dominant leg. So, for me, I'm a right I'm right-handed. So, we start with our weight on our right leg, transfer it to our non-dominant leg through as we hit. That's going to allow us to engage our core, our legs, and our glutes. That allows us to produce maximum power and consistently and effortlessly do so. Right with the arm, I'm kind of really forcing it just to get the power I got. When I was doing the other ones, I'm just letting it fly. Nothing really complicated, pretty simple, just swinging through the ball.
Thank you for coming back for another video. I will see everybody next.