Fatso Tennis

Posts Tagged ‘Tennis Forehand’

I was practicing my forehand on the ball machine yesterday in the 90 degree heat here in Virginia Beach.  I was trying to get more power on the ball without losing control.

I discovered some interesting things you might want to try out.

1. I was stepping directly into the shot with somewhat of a closed stance thinking this would get more weight into the ball and

2. I was swinging harder and faster.

Here’s what I learned. By closing the stance too much in an effort to get more weight into the ball I was ruining my swing path and spraying the ball everywhere. As soon as I opened up the stance to more of a neutral stance my swing path came back and it was the same for the full open stance. Lesson learned for this fat guy is that without having the supple waist and lots of room for my arm to maneuver around my gut, closing the stance too much will not work.

The second thing I learned was that by slowing down the swing but swinging earlier along with turning my body gave me much cleaner hits (because I wasn’t swinging too fast for my skill level) and got the result of much more controllable power on the ball.

So, practice opening your stance, and swinging slower with a body turn and watch your controllable power increase.

What an appropriate tip for this blog!

I was getting a lesson on Saturday from a guy who is about a 5.0 rating and pretty much feared around our region. He noted that I was doing a really poor job when I was pulled wide on a forehand.

He saw me running like a freight train and then eratically overhitting the ball.

His tip was . . . “follow my belly”. What he meant was that I had to stay more compact and smooth when I was running to get to the ball. Apparently I was flailing wildy as I ran. He felt that if I stayed more compact and kept my racquet more close to my stomach that I would have something concrete to concentrate on as I moved toward the ball.  . . .Hahahaha. I don’t know if he meant my stomach weighed as much as concrete, but the tip sure worked. I made a large improvement in my consistency on wide forehands in that one lesson.

Well, whether you are a fatso or not……I guess it’s a good idea to follow your belly