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VOLUME 1: THE FOREHAND
Part 6: Topspin:
I've said it before and I'll say it again: the most important part of these pages is the writing, because writing is the medium through which knowledge is passed on.
As someone of limited God-given tennis ability, I know from experience how difficult it can be to master a complete set of tennis strokes. But this weakness is also my strength, because it better qualifies me for the job at hand, which is:
1,to make technical tennis experts of all those who aren’t;
2, to put technical tennis knowledge in the minds of those who have no prior knowledge;
3, take the highest priciples of the art of tennis and translating them for all who want them;
4, to do justice to those who have laboured long and hard to rise above the on-court pack, and who are ill-served by platitudes and unknowing sentences.
The main benefit you will gain from taking the time to fully decipher, ponder, absorb and re-read the sentences is knowledge of excellence, especially of what's going on in the images, which have been specifically chosen, painstakingly prepared and lovingly captured, over many years as a working tennis photographer cum writer, at major tennis tournaments in Europe and America.
From the content contained within these pages, it is my hope that you will eventually be able to spot the flaws in both the games of others and yourselves, which is half the battle: if you know why the previous shot was a stinker, you can correct the flaw in the next shot.
But if you don't have the knowledge, you can neither recognize flaws nor work on putting them right.
Whether hitting slice, topspin, sidespin or a plain flat drive, each forehand needs racket head speed.
Racket head speed is what makes the strings move the tennis ball and without it there is simply no stroke.
The job of the various loops, wind-ups, take-backs and backswings is to make distance between the racket head and the ball, over which a player can build up racket head speed. But it's what you do with that racket head speed that determines what type of shot it is.
For example, if you crank up a large, looped forehand and generate loads of racket head speed, but the ball ends up high over the back fence and in the middle of a nearby housing estate, you have connected with the ball with a racket face that's wide open (why you've done so is not relevant here: probably the grip and/or contact point are the culprits).
The term 'open' means you've connected with the racket face at an 'open' angle, which puts strings underneath the ball. This is why the ball was lifted over the court back stop.
On the other hand, if the ball ends up at the bottom of the net, you have most likely hit with a 'closed' racket face, meaning the angle is closed and the racket has come some way over the ball at contact.
Both of these are examples of what not to do with all that racket head speed.
With this in mind, lets get back to the animated sequences.
In 6 you'll see Agassi's racket face at right angles to the ground. I've highlighted the image to give you an idea of the path the racket takes and this is a perfectly angled racket face for hitting topspin. In fact, with only slight variations in the angle of the racket face, the angle in the image is the one you'll see at virtually every perfect forehand contact.
Roger Federer may be a better all-round player, largely because he is a more complete athlete with a supreme racket-wielding gift, and the Sampras' first serve was usually too hot for everyone, including Agassi.
But few spectacles in tennis eclipse Agassi in his glory at the baseline, to which anyone who saw his last US Open final in 2005, against Federer, must bear witness.
Even in his mid 30s, Agassi matched the world's greatest player for over 2 sets of pulverizing ground stroke play, before he ran out of steam.
I've got sequence animations of the Agassi strokes dating back to 1987 or 88, when he first appeared at the French Open and The Lipton Championships in Miami, so this is one stroke I'm going to fully make sense of for readers: only when compared to forehands like those of Roddick, Graf, Safin, Guga, Nadal and Sampras does it fully make sense, and the particular differences in stroke play become clear.
But that's for the future.
Here we're going to look at a three more variations of hitting with topspin, and explore frontfooting and backfooting in a little more detail. Let's first take a glimpse of Andre Agassi's forehand.
The Forehand: Front Foot Topspin
In the seven frame sequence, you can see a fully turned Agassi shuffling up the court to meet the ball, as it rises (to waist height) from the bounce. Andre is hitting some front foot topspin: he's hitting a powerful, aggressive forehand and he's harnessing that power with a substantial amount of topspin.
Andre uses a loop on his forehand, which is a little bigger than the one we’ve seen Michael Chang use. What is important is the continuous build up of racket head speed, which is an essential part of Agassi's power forehand, and I reckon Andre shifted the racket head through the air as quickly as anyone in the history of tennis (over a set distance).
In 5 I’ve highlighted the path of the racket head, to give you a clearer picture of how the racket head is dipped below the height of the ball, before being powered up and through the back of a perfect contact, for a marriage of power and topspin.
This dropping of the racket head below the height of the forthcoming contact is essential for topspin, because if you are ripping the strings up the back of an out front contact, you need somewhere to hit up from.
I mean, you can't hit up the back of the ball from above it, can you?
So it makes sense that you get the racket head below the oncoming ball in time to enable you to hit up.
We’ll cover this more fully in the backhand section, but a general rule is that the greater the topspin you want to put on the ball, the lower down you should be getting your racket head at the end of your loop, before you start swinging through to meet with your perfect contact.
In the final frame of the Agassi sequence, you can see the racket head has been whipped up and over to the side of his body, at the end of the stroke. This is relevant to the next sequence.
Back Foot Topspin
This 9 frame sequence of Gabby Sabatini reveals a lot, so we'll return to it at a later date, when we have more stroke variations to compare it with.
In the first 3 frames you can see Gabby's looped forehand wind up, which is pretty big and over the years such a loop has been typical of European and South American topspin merchants, who play the clay courts so well.
In the third frame of each sequence (3 and 10) you can compare the height that each racket head rises up to, and in frame 12 Gabby confirms that this is going to be a heavy topspin forehand.
How can we tell?
Most obviously because she has dropped the racket head low beneath the height of the (impending) contact.
But also because her weight stays on the back foot, rather than shifting through and into the forward contact, which would signal a far more aggressive, flat forehand.
Pointless shifting her efforts through and into the forward contact if she wants to direct the force upwards, don't you agree?
This is virtually the same view we had of Wilander in a previous 3 frame sequence. In the initial frames Gabby loops up considerable racket head speed, and in 13 she has delivered her pay load to the ball.
In frames 13 & 14 I've given a little shape to the workings of Gabby's racket, as she whips her strings up the back of her perfect contact.
Roll your mouse over all the buttons and see how she helps direct the force up the back of the ball by pushing up from her bent right (back) leg.
The shape of this follow through has often been likened to the motion of a windscreen wiper. Look again and you can see clearly from the first part of this sequence what Gabby's intentions are.
Gabby has looped up a lot of racket head speed.
But where does it go after the racket face has delivered its pay load to the ball?
In 14 & 15 you can see the force is allowed to run its course, as it gradually winds to a halt on the opposite side of her body.
This up-and-over follow through is the gradual winding down of racket head speed.
It is the force being given time and space to slow up.
It is the calm, after the storm of racket head speed Gabby whipped up for her perfect contact.
Rafa Nadal Topspin
Whilst taking a first look at topspin we may as well take a peek at the forehand of the new king of the cloth rippers, Rafa Nadal.
Most groundstrokes are a mixture of power and topspin and the Nadal forehand is a great example of no-holds barred topspin and power.
We’ll take an in depth look at the Nadal forehand at the end of this section. But in the meantime run frames 16 thru 20 and take note of the ferocity with which Rafa whips up racket head speed and shreds the cloth on the back of the ball.
But this isn’t just whippy topspin and little power, like Wilander’s: this is arguably the perfect marriage of topspin and proof of this is found in the way the whole of Rafa’s right side comes spinning through into the shot.
Different Strokes: You are what you Hit
As I've stated, a player's strokes often develop along the lines of personality, physique and attitude. A tall, athletic specimen with a short attention span, for example, might be drawn instinctively (or encouraged) towards the net, in an effort to end the points swiftly, whereas a slightly built youngster, with a calm nature may be attracted to a patient, topspin baseline game.
In many respects Andre hits like he is; the aggressive player imposing the weight of his talent on his opponent, irrespective of who that opponent may be.
Sabatini could both attack and defend, and it wasn't unheard of for her to attack the net. But her natural topspin baseline game might reflect an inner willfulness, which is also required to grind out long, tiring rallies on South American clay.
Rafa Nadal was born to commit himself fully to whatever he does. The image of the Matador is well suited to his bullish love of the fight, and his strokes are the children of a total competitor and the obsessive need to work himself (and the ball) to the limit.
Aggression and flamboyance can lure tennis players of talent onto the front foot, where they can play with passion and daring.
Patience, steadfastness and a thoughtful nature, on the other hand, can put people on the back foot, where they can grind away with topspin and make front-foot players stretch and strain for every single point.
However, gifted players who incorporate each style behind a steely competitiveness and obsessive work ethic, have the potential for true tennis greatness.
