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Tennis Lessons - Tennis

Fremen's Guide to Tennis [Swing]

August 4th 2009 06:02

It's time to start talking about actually playing the game. Now, there are so many aspects of tennis to get bogged down in, and so many things to learn that it can make your head spin. I'm not going to lie, the best way to do this is to find an informal teacher or go get lessons, but I hope to be one of the next best things. There are tons of guides out there, and I want to pick out some of the most helpful ones for you to look at when you want to up your game.

Sampras on his way down from one of his legendary smashes.

Basics:

Most people know what a swing is, but it's a little more complicated than just hitting the ball. Ideally, you'll have your feet set up into a good stance, and you'll involve your whole body into the shot. I want to just cover the simplest things here, since you can get bogged down so easily into the details.

This is a good site for learning some basics.

If you like math and want to learn some interesting things about tennis: Click on this, and look around.

Basically, if you want to learn tennis, the best thing to do is practice. Practice never makes perfect, but in tennis, the closer you get, the better.

Common Shot Vocab:

This is a guide for watching tennis and playing also. If you want to sound smart, you should learn some terms:

Overhead shot/smash: This is a shot played after the serve that looks the same as a serve. Usually a player will finish the point by doing one of these. Basically, Pete Sampras was the king of these. The idea is to hit these as hard as possible so that your opponent can't react fast enough or reach them.

Inside-Out Forehand: Basically, for a righty, this is a forehand in which you are standing on the left side of the court, and you hit it to the right side. The opposite goes for lefties obviously. Here's an example of Federer ripping one against Agassi. This is a hard shot to pull off, and feels weird when you first try it.

Drop Shot: This is a shot, where if employed correctly, will always win you the point. This is a very common shot since it's pretty easy to pull off depending on the situation (like, if you're facing anyone other than Andy Murray or Gael Monfils). What you want to do is slice the ball and hit it as softly as possible to get it in. Federer hated playing these, but he wasn't bad at them at all.

Two Handed Backhand: It's pretty self explanatory. There are a couple of varieties. Lleyton Hewitt has a good one to look at. Other notable current players with two handers: Nadal, Roddick, Djokovic, Roddick, and Safin (he's got a pretty cool one too).

One Handed Backhand: Once again, self explanatory. Roger Federer hits the meanest one handed backhand on the tour right now. It's the more traditional, and less powerful (usually) shot.

Half Volley/On the Rise: This is when one hits the ball while it's rising. It's much harder than it sounds, but if you can pull it off, it is a very powerful and effective shot. Here is a quick three minute guide on how Federer does it.

Spoon Serve: This is EXTREMELY rare among pros, but there is one instance of this that lives on in Tennis History. Here is the most famous Spoon Serve EVER hit. Yeah, I'll post about that later. It was epic.

This concludes my first guide to Tennis Swings. There will be many more after this, and probably a lot of ones that are based off things touched upon in this post.

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Posted By: Fremen - Category: Tennis Lessons

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Fremen's Guide to Tennis [Court Surfaces]

July 30th 2009 18:03

This is the second edition of my guide to tennis. This is made for the non fan, and has a very simplified explanation of all things tennis.

Court Surfaces

Nadal vs. Federer on Grass-Clay Court

There are three basic courts:

Clay
Hard
Grass

As you can tell by my wonderful use of primary (and secondary) colors, clay is usually red, grass is usually green, and hard courts are usually blue. This said, green clay, blue clay, and green hard courts are also very common. I've also heard of Black clay, and hard courts that come in every color (orange, bright green, red, and even three different colors for World Team Tennis). The best way to tell is it get down on your knees and lick the court (j/k).

Ok, that would actually work out really well, but for reasons that don't need to be said, it's better to just touch them. Hard Courts will usually be asphalt or some sort of plastic that is (surprise!) hard to the touch. Grass will feel like dirt, and Clay has a little layer of dust on the top.

Seriously, it's not hard at all to distinguish them.

Click on this if you like reading Wiki pages more than me. (It'll have more detail, references, and no fun.)

----------------------------- -----------------------------
Clay Courts
(click on the title!)

Guillermo Coria and Carlos Moya on the signature red Clay Courts of the French Open

These courts are the classically colored "red" courts. The French Open (Roland Garros) is traditionally associated with this. Other famous tournaments on Clay include Barcelona, Madrid, Rome, and a number of South American Tournaments like Vina Del Mar. *You'll find that since Tournaments are always switching sponsorship, it's easier to refer to them by location.*

Most courts are made from brick because literal clay courts, like those of the olden days take too long to dry out. You'll find these are usually red. The "American" clay courts are green in color.

Clay courts are defined as "Slow courts". This is because the ball bounces higher, and bounces slower than it would on a hard court. Because of this high bounce, players that use a LOT of topspin, like Nadal and Federer are at an advantage, since they force players to constantly hit tiring shoulder-level shots.

Clay is unique because of the movement. It is actually (all too) possible, and necessary to slide on clay. This sliding comes naturally to players that have played on clay from a young age. Because of this, these players are at a natural advantage on clay. I would tell you what a "clay court specialist" is like Wikipedia, but unlike Wiki, I believe in the intelligence of the people that read this.

Another unique thing about the clay is that the ball leaves a mark on the ground, making the use of shot tracking devices...well...useless. That means that this'll never happen or matter on clay.

The best Clay Court specialists of all time include the recently retired Gustavo Kuerten, legend Bjorn Borg, classic Rene Lacoste, and current Clay Champion Rafael Nadal (he still has more than Federer).

----------------------------- -----------------------------

Hard Courts
(OMG Click on that too!)

Andre Agassi serving to Pete Sampras at the Australian Open

Now, here is where you can see the difference between me and the Wiki monstah (I'm from Boston, that's how we say it).

Basically, there are two types of hard courts, asphalt, and acrylic hybrid courts of all types. The Australian Open and the US Open play on Hard Courts.

The most common hard court you'll see is just plain asphalt. This is the variety, indoor and outdoor that I was raised on, and it's where I am comfortable, like many, many tennis players around the US. Neither the US Open, nor the Australian Open use this.

The US Open uses this.

Until recently, the Australian Open used this, but then they switched to this.

To be honest, pretty much only the pros would notice, or care so much about these changes, since tennis is such a precise sport (less precise than Billiards/Pool or golf, but more than, say, Hockey or Basketball).

The most interesting thing for me about hard courts is that many players still manage to slide on it, since they are so athletic, and move so quickly.

The best hard courters of all time are much harder to define, since almost all the greats were good on it. Roger Federer, Pete Sampras, and Andre Agassi are three recent greats.

----------------------------- -----------------------------

Grass

(you should know by now...)

Federer getting ready to serve at Wimbledon.

The oldest and most traditional of the tennis surfaces. Once upon a time, 3 of the opens were held on this surface, then two of them upgraded to most consistent ones. For a long time, grass courts played quickly but they are known as "Slow courts". The grass at Wimbledon is actually getting slower every year. The courts used to give the advantage to serve and volley-ers who would come in on every single point. This has recently given way to baseline grass court play, which makes for a more well rounded and interesting match.

One problem with grass is that sometimes it's slippery. If you want a great example of a professional demonstrating how slippery these courts are, just watch Djokovic's first match of the Wimbledon this year. The year before, he complained about his shoes being too slippery, and it seemed like the problem persisted. Obviously, this affects other players, but Djokovic is a very good digger and almost never loses his balance on any surface. His slipping at this year's Wimbledon opening round surprised me, but after that dreadful first round, his foot work looked (as they say in England) dapper.

Currently, Wimbledon is one of the only tournaments played on grass, and certainly is the most important. Federer, Borg, Sampras, Agassi, McEnroe and Connors all found Wimbledon to be one of their best stages.

If you want to read more about the more obscure surfaces like carpet, go somewhere else. Honestly, I'm not even willing to give it time of day. (take that carpet fans!)

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Posted By: Fremen - Category: Tennis Lessons

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Fremen's Guide to Tennis [The Court Basics]

July 30th 2009 02:29

Hi everybody,

I want this site to be for more than just the hard-core tennis fan. I also want this to be for the average person, who is slightly interested in tennis and doesn't know much about the sport. I know that when I was first learning about tennis, I learned one thing in lessons, and quite another by watching tennis. There was so much more to the game than I thought there was and this is going to be the first of many posts where I talk about tennis in general, or tennis history.

This post will be about the court, and each post will have a similar theme about the game (i.e. The Swing, Footwork, Psychology, The Serve).

Hall of Fame Tennis Court and Fred Perry Statue

The Court

A Fully Labeled Tennis Court

Sorry for the blurriness, I've been having trouble with this on Orble in other posts too. The best thing would be to click on that and just keep it open while I explain what each term means.

From the top:

Baseline - This is the line that defines the length of the court. You cannot touch this with your feet during your serve, and if the ball bounces past it, then it is deemed out. It is recommended to stay around the baseline during points as an optimal area to cover the court.

Center Mark - This does almost nothing. Just stay on the right side of it when serving on even points (i.e. to start a game, at duece, 30-love, 15-all, etc.), and the left on odd points.

Doubles Alleys - These widen the points for doubles play. In doubles, the serve can also be behind these areas (as opposed to only behind the single's court). The serve must still go in the service box, but any balls after the serve can go anywhere on the court, including the double's alleys.

Service Line - The ball must bounce on this line or before it (towards the net) to be deemed in. If it goes past, then it is out.

Service Box - Served balls must bounce in this box.

Net (not shown) - This is the dark line that splits the court in half in the picture. It is pretty much self explanatory. The top part is called the "tape" or "cord".

Center Line - Serves can bounce on this line and be called in from either side.

No Man's Land - This is generally a bad place to stand. You either want to be at the baseline, hitting rallies, or up at the net playing volleys. Obviously, as you get more into the game, you'll see that this is overgeneralized, but it's a great starting point for strategy.

Ad Court - This side of the court is called "Ad Court" because you play only on that side during Advantage points.

Deuce Court - This is misspelled on the picture, the spelling here is correct. It's the exact opposite as the Ad Court.

I hope this was helpful. In my next posts, I think I'll describe more about the history of courts and the surfaces.

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