Chapter 5: Serving Practice

The main lineup of the NCAA tennis team has a total of six singles and six doubles positions, and there are also six substitute positions. It is very common for singles players to also play doubles.

In the team competition, a total of three doubles and six singles matches will be played.

It is also because of this that even freshmen can compete for the starting position.

Previously, the autumn season from September to November had just ended. As a traditional NCAA tennis powerhouse, the Bruins had a total of four players ranked in the US singles. Naturally, these four players also entered the main lineup, including McDonald, who served as the fourth singles player.

In addition, four players including Gao Wen have their own strengths and weaknesses, and their records and strengths are comparable. They will compete for the No. 5 singles and No. 6 singles positions.

Therefore, the first small goal after rebirth is the number six - no, it should be the number one singles position.

"Mike, how about starting training now?"

Gawain rubbed his hands in anticipation and jumped, like a little deer, bounding towards the direction of the court.

McDonald was dumbfounded. "Now? But the coach and the others will take a while..."

Winter training is when the entire tennis team trains together to prepare for the spring season.

However, according to NCAA regulations, training hours per week are not allowed to exceed twenty hours. This is to protect the players' career lifespan and avoid premature injuries, while also ensuring the completion of their studies.

During the off-season, the total training time per week is compressed to nine hours, because December is also the time for college final exams. Before the Christmas vacation, students still have heavy study and examination tasks to complete. For the NCAA, this is an absolute bottom line that cannot be shaken.

It is precisely because of this that winter training is easier than normal training.

Now, before the coaching staff and other teammates arrived at the training ground, Gawain was already impatient to go out for training. MacDonald was full of questions: Although Gawain usually trained very hard, it was rare for him to be so anxious. What happened today? Confused, MacDonald also rushed out, and then he could see Gawain had already started serving practice.

In a tennis match, the serving phase is the most special because it is the only phase that is not interfered with by the opponent and is completely under your control.

Once the serve is completed, the next round is a contest between players, confrontation, calculation, pressure, and counterattack. Both sides need to make one decision after another in one thousandth of a second that may change the direction of the game. Both sides are restraining each other.

It can truly be said that things are changing rapidly!

This further highlights the importance of serving. If you can establish an advantage through serving, you can seize the initiative in the next round.

In fact, after understanding the connection between tennis and table tennis, you can better understand the sport of tennis.

In the 19th century, tennis was popular throughout Europe, but due to venue and weather restrictions, it could not be played frequently. So British college students came up with a way to bring tennis indoors, using the dining table as a "table", applying the same rules but making some adjustments, and created "table tennis."

This is what table tennis is today - the International Table Tennis Federation is called the "International-Table-Tennis-Federation". Although the literal translation of "Ping-Pong" has gradually become widely known, "Table Tennis" is still the official name of table tennis.

If you understand table tennis, you will have a preliminary understanding of tennis.

These two sports are both about the art of rotation, and they both require strong support from power and explosiveness. They both require constant calculations by the brain, and they both attach importance to the advantages established by serving rights - the offensive layout in the first three shots can often widen the gap.

The importance of serving is self-evident.

However, when it comes to specific serving techniques, there are obvious differences between table tennis and tennis.

Serving in tennis is a whole-body movement: bend your knees, push off the ground, straighten your knees, twist your waist, and straighten your back; then pour all your strength into the racket, completing the friction and downward pressure, like cracking a whip, and swinging it out with all your strength.

This is a continuous movement. The power is generated from the soles of the feet and after a series of movements, it is poured into the palms. If there is a problem in any link, the serve effect may not be satisfactory.

In an intense game, in the second half, physical strength is severely reduced, the thighs cannot push off the ground, and the leg power cannot be transmitted upward. The player can only rely on the strength of the arms and shoulders to complete the serve. Then the speed and accuracy will drop rapidly, and even continuous mistakes will occur.

Andy Roddick is considered one of the best servers in history. Just look at his serve:

The knees are like springs, and the entire movement of pushing off the ground and exerting force is very complete. The body is like a full bow, pouring all the strength into the racket. At the moment of serving, you can even see the tennis ball being flattened, creating the effect of a cannon serve.

Therefore, tennis serve training is also very complicated.

Without the ball, practice basic movements, movement breakdown, and complete movements. It is common to practice five hundred swings in the air.

When there is a ball, you need to repeat the above actions to continuously deepen your muscle memory, stabilize the serving action, and serve two hundred times becomes a habit.

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All of these are just training for serving movements and have not yet entered into actual practice.

Next, practice different types of serves, pursuing flat shots with extreme speed, spinning shots that focus on landing points, and slice serves that make full use of techniques. The main focus is on the way the racket and tennis ball touch each other, and how the wrist uses power - this still does not include actual practice.

Then comes the landing point practice, which is the so-called actual serve.

The first stage of practice is to divide the serving area into nine grids, and each time the serve is required to land in the designated target area.

The second stage develops the nine-square grid into the "nine-nine eighty-one-square grid", with a total of eighty-one small grids. The goal is to ensure that each serve lands in the designated area.

It's really abnormal.

Therefore, those top serving experts often start with 500 serves in their daily serving practice.

At this moment, considering that the tennis court is not divided into nine grids, Gao Wen is practicing a simplified version of the drop serve against the wall, and the bang bang bang sounds are particularly pleasant.

(End of this chapter)