Our time together has come to an end. We have experienced a lot together. We've discussed the history of tennis. We've learned the rules and basics of a tennis match. We've got the techniques of serving, forehand and backhand down. Now it's time for you to take what you've (hopefully) learned and try out your skills.
Everyone has to start somewhere, so don’t give up if you aren’t the greatest the first time you pick up a racket. The pros we see on TV started at young ages, and have played for years. Don’t compare yourselves to them! And remember even they have bad days. Don't worry if you don't catch onto everything right away. If you keep playing things will come naturally, you'll learn the easiest way for you to hit, and what your strengths and weaknesses are.
Tennis can be difficult and a bit frustrating, but don’t give up! Practice makes perfect and tennis is a game that you can play all your life.
ALL YOUR LIFE!
Once you’ve played, you’ll never give it up!“Tennis is an addiction that once it has truly hooked a man will not let him go”, Russell Lynes.
But if you try out the game and decide it’s not for you, at least now you’ll be able to understand what’s happening when your watching a match on TV.I hope you learned something from this tennis blog and I hope you enjoy tennis as much as I do. In fact, I love it so much, I’m going to go play…. Right now! Have a good day and remember: tennis is amazing!
Sincerely, Whitney
Oh... if you're interested here are some of the best and worst moments in tennis history. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQxIEXFIkd4, (Sorry I can't get the video but here's the link)
All right, now that we’ve covered serving, let’s talk about actually hitting the ball. There are two ways to hit the ball: forehand and backhand.
Forehand is when the player holds the racket face forward with their palm open. For right-handed players, forehand is played on the right hand side of a player, and if you are a left handed player it’s played on the left.
Foreha
Hitting forehand is the natural way a player hits. This type of hit is a key to winning any match. It’s the first hit most players learn, as it’s the easiest of all the hits to master.
Here are the technical steps of hitting a forehand.
1. Position yourself just inside the baseline and near the centerline.
2. Have your feet shoulder width apart, just like you do when you are serving.
3. Make sure you hold your racket about waist level directly in front of you. Also make sure your knees are slightly bent.
4. When the ball is coming toward you turn your shoulders to the right if your right-handed, and to the left if your left-handed, lower the racket towards the court.
6. Pivot right or left, depending on which hand you hit with. Then take your other foot, step forward and plant it towards the left or right net post. While doing this, swing the racket backward and pull it up from the ground.
7. Pull the racket back until it reaches your waist level, make sure your arm is extended and relaxed. Your arm and the racket should be perpendicular to the net.
8. As the ball reaches you, begin driving the racket forward using your shoulders. Don't let your arm change positions. Grip the racket firmly but avoid squeezing the handle too hard.
9. You should make contact with the ball slight in front of your body.
10. Follow through with the hit, make sure that your racket ends up by your shoulders, pointing at the sky and in the direction of the ball you just hit.
That sounds like a lot I know, but here is a picture that shows what you should be doing. Don’t worry though, as soon you as you get out on the court and start hitting the ball you’ll get the hang of it.
Backhand
The Backhand technique is a bit more difficult than the forehand, but is also just as important. This technique can be used as a defensive move or an offensive move. With backhand, right-handed players play this on their left side, while left handed players play with their right side. Confused? Don’t be. It can be thought of as a backwards shot. You still use whatever hand you use to hit the ball normally.
Here are the technical steps for hitting a backhand:
1.Start at the baseline, near the centerline
2.Move from the ready, neutral position while pulling the racket back.
3.Keep your right, or left hand loose on the grip
4.Move the racket toward the inside of your body, with both arms held close.
5.Cross over with your right foot, or your left.
6.Dip the right or left shoulder to the front
7.When the ball is near release the racket head, it should be like throwing the shot from your right shoulder.
8. Follow through by going up and over the right, or left shoulder, for a two handed shot, and extend your playing arm straight out for a one handed shot.
Okay with step eight, there are two ways you can grip the racket; two hands or one handed. Either works fine, you’ll just have to try both and find out which one seems more comfortable to you.
Here’s a picture of a backhand in action
Both of these types of hits are important for offense and defense. Once you start playing you’ll get the hang of both and be able to volley with your opponent. Volleying is hitting the ball back and forth with your opponent. It's important to point out that with all types of hits the player needs to hit the racket in it's sweet spot. That's the very center of the racket. Hitting the ball there gives the player more power and control!
There are some great videos that take about a minute to learn the tricks of the forehand and backhand strokes. http://www.tennischannel.com/babolat/
There are different trick hits that professionals use. These include the overhead shot, the lob and the trick shot. If you’d like to learn more about these shots I suggest going to the following website. http://www.all-about-tennis.com/backhand.html
Today's information came from the following places.
One of the hardest things about tennis is the serve. It is a vital part of the game and a great serve can sometimes be the deciding factor in who wins and who loses a game.
Each time a player is serving they have two chances to get the ball over the net and into the correct service box. (We talked about these in the last post.) Whether in a singles match or a doubles match, the player serving serves for the entire game. So in a match with two players, player one will serve until someone wins that game. Then if it is an odd game, meaning if the score is 1-0 or 3-2, the players switch what side of court they are on. It is the same with a doubles match, whatever player is serving serves the entire game, then a player from the other team serves, then it switches again until every player has served. Then the pattern restarts until a match is won.
Having a killer serve is vital to any game. A great serve can be the deciding factor in who wins and who loses a match. Check out this amazing serve by Andy Roddick:
Clearly a beginner won't be able to serve quite like that, at least not yet anyway.
I need to point out that there are three different types of serves, the flat/basic serve which is generally used as a first serve and is hit with a flat trajectory and minimum spin. The next type is the topspin serve, which has a higher trajectory and has a kick when it bounces back up. This serve is used mainly as a second serve. The third type is slice serve. This type of serve has topspin and side spin which means that it spins in the air and then again when it hits the ground. This is used as an alternative serve for either of the two earlier serves. For right now we are going to just discuss the basics of any serve.
There are five main things to work on for a great serve. These things are 1. Stance 2. Grip 3. The Ball 4. Feet Position and 5. The Ball Toss.
The stance is very important to serving, you should aim to have your feet shoulder width apart. Make sure your front foot is a few inches away from the baseline so that you don't commit a foot fault. Also depending on what type of match, singles or doubles you will choose where to stand on the baseline. Keep your knees bent. Here is an example of what your stance should look like:
The stance: feet apart, knees bent
Next is the grip. There are a few different types of grips but for a beginner we'll use the continental grip. You should aim to have the space between your thumb and your first finger fall exactly in line with the head of the racket. To accomplish this my tennis coach told us to act as if we were shaking hands with the tennis racket. It works well. Having a good grip on the racket can help you control where you want the ball to go. The continental grip also helps with the snap of the wrist and spin control of the ball. Snapping your wrist when serving is a good technique to learn as well.
Continental Grip
Now that we have our stance ready, and our tight grip we need to talk about what to do with the ball. You want to hold the ball between your thumb and all four fingers, or basically like you would with any other ball.
Next is feet position. Just like in baseball, whatever way your feet are planted is the way the ball is going to go so you want to make sure your feet are point towards the target zone. This will be easier to understand after you go out and practice for awhile. Finally the ball toss comes and you want to make sure the ball goes quite high, like a couple inches higher than your racket can reach. Make sure the ball goes straight up in front of you and lands a few inches in front of your feet. Of course you're going to hit it before it hits the ground but this is a good way to make sure you are tossing the ball correctly. You will want to make contact with the ball when your racket is on its way down. I like to think of it as a clock hand at noon. Start swinging down but don't forget to follow through with the swing or your serve could end up in the net or going too far.
Right before contact
Having a good serve is important, but don't get frustrated if at first your don't succeed. Keep trying it will eventually happen. If you can conquer the serve the rest of the game will be a piece of cake. Here is an illustrated diagram of what the process of serving should look like.
Just keep trying the serve it will come eventually and when it does you'll be pleasantly surprised. Just keep in mind the five important factors we discussed. Here is a great video that shows a pro serving and it breaks down his every move and finally shows what the serve is in full motion. I hope you enjoy!!!
YouTube also has many amazing clips and beginner videos to help with serving. Check out http://youtube.com/.
To someone who has never played tennis, or watched a match before, the court can be a bit confusing. I've made a diagram to try and help explain it all:
1. The Single's Sideline- This is the out-of-bounds line for a Singles match in tennis. I'll explain what a Singles match is in a bit.
2. The Double's Sideline- This is the out-of-bounds line for a Doubles match. I'll also explain this in more detail.
3. The Double's Alley- This is just a part of the court that the Single's don't play with. It's only used for Doubles.
4. The Baseline- The baseline is the out-of-bounds at the end of each side of the court. If a ball hits here, it's considered out and the other player gets the point. This is also where the players serve from.
5. Left Service Box- This is where the player aims when serving from the advantage court. Look at #8 below.
6. Right Service Box- This is where the player aims when serving from the deuce court. Look at #7 below.
7. Deuce Court- This is the right side of the court. From here players serve to the right service box. All games start from this court. All even points are played from this side. (Don't worry scoring will be explained later.)
8. Advantage Court- This is the left side of the court. Players serve to the left service box. All odd points are played from this side of the court.
Scoring
Now that you have a better grasp of the court lets move onto scoring.
First 1 or 2 players are on opposite sides of the court. It depends on the type of match Singles or Doubles for how many players there are. (This will be explained in the next paragraph.) Then whoever whens a coin toss, or raquet spin decides who is going to be recieving and who is going to be serving first. Then which ever player is serving starts from the deuce court, always the deuce court. They then serve to the right service court, (confused? go look at the court section.) as the game goes on points will add up. This is how the score is kept in tennis. It goes LOVE-15-30-40-Game. I know! LOVE? That makes no sense, but that's how its kept. Anyway the server always says their score first, so 15-LOVE, to be polite say the score before each serve. If a game score gets to 40-40 or 40 all, then the players must enter deuce. While in deuce the score is Advantage-in or Advantage-out. Ad-in means that the server got the point, while Ad-out means the reciever got the point. A game must be won by two points. Each Match has three sets of six games each. I should clarify that in each set the first person to win six games gets the set, to win a match a player must win two out of three sets.
A player scores a point when the opposing player misses the ball, serves out-of-bounds or hits it into the net or out-of-bounds. A player gets two chances to serve each point. If the ball doesn't hit into the right service box or hits the net, then the player "Takes 2" and serves again. If a ball hits the net but goes over, it is called a LET and the player gets to try the serve again, so potenitally with that the player has three opportunities to get the ball over the net. If a ball hits the net and goes over when not in service it counts as a point if the opposing player doesn't return the ball.
Singles and Doubles matches
Left: Singles Match
Right: Doubles Match
The main difference between a Singles match and a Doubles match is that one uses two players on each team and the other is a solo thing. In a Singles match one player is on each side of the net. The players use the first white line as their out-of-bounds line. The scoring and rules are the same. In a doubles match there are four players, two on each side. The out-of-bounds line is the second or furthest white line. When serving, the player in the correct service box must be the first one to hit the ball, other than that all the rules are the same.
I think we've covered everything, and maybe a little bit more, than the basics needed to get started. We've talked about the court, scoring and the rules. Next time we'll talk about serving and hitting the ball.
Hi There! So before we begin talking about the awesomely amazing game of tennis maybe I should provide a quick overview of how it all began.
The exact history of of tennis has been disputed, some say that European monks began this game while others say it started in Egypt or Greece. For now, we'll stick to the Monk theory. European Monks originally developed the game for entertainment purposes and during religious celebrations.
Old Wooden Tennis Ball
Tennis was originally played with the hands and a wooden ball. OUCH!Then the Monks got smarter and decided to use a leather glove and a ball made from leather and stuffed with cellulose material. After awhile the Monks got really smart and decided a handle was needed to help serve and hit the ball. Thus the first racket was born! The game was played in a courtyard using a net, or inside using the wall to bounce the ball off of. (For a good example of what this might have looked like check out the movie Ever After, there's a scene where the royals are playing tennis)
Tennis became popular among the monasteries and then all over the place, especially in France. There it was adopted by the royal families and spread like the plague. It became so popular that Louis IV and the Pope tried to ban it. Henry VII and Henry VIII were avid supports so tennis
courts began popping up all over Europe.
Major Walter C. Wingfield
After some time, Major Walter C. Wingfield decided to patent the equipment and rules of the game that is similar today's tennis. This took place in 1874. This is also the year that tennis courts reached the United States. Wingfield's game was played on Croquet courts originally because of how smooth they were. He made rules that were highly critized and eventually he changed them. Wingfield then left the evolution of tennis up to other people.
In 1877, the first Wimbledon tournament was held by the All England Club. The tournament committee changed Wingfield's court design from an hourglass, short court, to a rectangular shape. The committee also came up with the rules that are most like the ones we use today. The net was left at five feet high, which was like the orignal game, and the service boxes were 26 feet deep. But by 1882 the specifications of the court had been set to what they are today.
YouTube also has many amazing clips and beginner videos to help with serving. Check out 
