Transcription
If you're over 50 and play pickle ball, here's a crazy idea. Why not let the coach who wears readers show you a serve that'll actually work for players like us. There's a ton of advice out there as to what type of serve you need to play.
In this video coaching lesson, I'm going to show you the serve that I use both in recreational play as well as tournament play at the US Open. Make sure you stay tuned to the end of the video because at the end I'm going to teach you three keys to hitting your effective serve just like that.
So, how do we know what characteristics our serve needs to have in order for it to be effective? The way we know that is by understanding what we're trying to accomplish with this shot. This same process applies to all the shots you hit in pickle ball. Whether it's your serve, your return, your third, your fourth, keep going. You want to understand how that shot fits into the framework of pickle ball. In other words, how does that shot interplay with the rules, with the strategies, with the objectives that you have when you're playing? That's how you can determine whether the shot that you're actually trying to hit is an effective shot or not.
Specific to the serve, what we're trying to do with the serve is set the stage most favorably to our team. Now, obviously, when we're serving, we're playing on the serve side. So, we want to make our job as easy as possible. And we do that by using the serve to apply pressure on our opponents. The more pressure we can apply on our opponents, the more effective our serve will be.
Now, there is a limitation. And there is a caveat here, if you will, which is we don't want to miss our serve. So, we're balancing the margins that we give ourselves within our serve together with the effectiveness of the serve in terms of the pressure it applies on the return side. In a minute, I'm going to show you exactly what you need to do to hit this very effective serve.
Now, to be clear, this serve is effective at all levels of play. In fact, even the pros use it a lot when they're playing. But this server is particularly effective for 50 plus play, as I'll explain when we get into those details. In the meantime, if you're a 50 plus player, make sure you subscribe and hit the bell notifications to this channel because this channel is dedicated to players just like me and just like you.
Let's take a look at some of the other serves that players chase out there, and then I'll give you the specifics on how to hit this very effective serve. Talk to enough of your fellow players or watch enough YouTube videos and you're going to see all sorts of serves including the hard serve, the cut serve, sometimes called the corkcrew or the spin serve, the extra heavy top spin serve, the short angle serve that's also hit with spin on it, and there's even a lob serve. The questions we need to answer about having all these different serves as part of our game is, are these serves actually worth the extra investment in time to learn all of these different serve variants in order to bring them into our game? Or is there one serve that'll accomplish what we want to do when we're playing?
As I shared earlier in this lesson, what we're trying to do with our serve is to set the stage for our team as favorably as we can by applying pressure on our opponents. That serve there, you probably saw on the camera, bounced pretty deep on the court and it actually did not hit the court again until it had hit the fence. So, you can imagine trying to return a serve like that where you're basically getting pushed back into the fence like that serve there hit the tripod, right, which is at the fence. So you can see how these serves are able to apply pressure on the returner because they're pushing the returner back off the line and away from where they're trying to hit the shot.
There are three keys to accomplishing this serve and these are the exact specifications of how you get this serve into your game. The first characteristic of it is it has a nice height over the net. That's a really important part of this shot. What that does is it makes sure that you're not going to hit the net. It also allows you to hit with more ease to get the depth on the shot that you're looking for.
As we get older, right, we don't want to spend that much energy on these serves. What happens is when we serve low like that, it's really hard to get the ball deep. I'm I'm really cranking this ball, right? To get the ball deep like that. It's still bouncing right before the fence. I can hit a much softer serve along this trajectory there and it's going to go the depth that I want.
I just mentioned the term trajectory. Probably something that you haven't thought about in terms of your pickle ball. If this kind of concept appeals to you, this kind of specificity and clarity on what you're doing, join us inside one of our online coaching opportunities. We have several of them and you'll start learning these important concepts like trajectory so you can add them to your play.
Now that we have clarity on the height over the net, let's talk about where I'm aiming my serve. Where I'm aiming my serve is exactly middle of the service box about 4 ft from the baseline. That is not necessarily where I'm going to hit it. Although that was pretty close. It's just where I'm aiming. That that nice depth there. That was a little shorter than I wanted to. That good depth there like that, right? That that target will give me the depth that I'm looking for without too much risk. I'm giving myself as much as I can from the side, right side and center line. And I'm giving myself a nice foroot cushion from the baseline. So, I get depth without needlessly risking missing the serve.
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One additional key to having an effective serve is to have a consistent stroke mechanic. This is another reason why trying to vary your serve can negatively impact you. Because if you're coming up to serve and then you're trying to hit like that cute, you know, inside out little short angle serve with a little bit cut like that, right? That serve has a very different stroke mechanic than that serve and has a very different stroke mechanic than that serve. Right? So, the more different types of stroke mechanics I have, the more variance I'm going to have in my serve.
That last shot serve that I just hit will work perfectly. And if I hit that same serve every time, I'll get the job done with less mistakes. An effective serve, particularly when you're an effective pickle ball serve, particularly An effective pickle ball serve, particularly when we're 50 plus, having an effective pickle ball surf. particularly when we're over 50 is all about getting the serve in and deep.
I'm going to put a link up here to an absolutely free Better Play guide where we share with you awesome tips that'll help you improve your play. You'll also be signed up for our weekly newsletter where we share more tips throughout the year. Until our next coaching lesson, I'll see you next time.