How high thy hands?

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Ahem.

Sh players: how high do you hold your blade, and why? What about your thumb position?

***

An anecdote to get the ball rolling - feel free to skip and just discuss the above question.

I used to aim to keep my hand as high as it will go. This recently led me to get a handle with a thumb rest designed for that purpose on my BBC flashdrive: Charlie calls it a ledge, shorter and much steeper than anything I’ve seen on a commercial blade.

After a few weeks I couldn’t deny that most of my shots get better if I let my thumb sit a tiny bit lower on the thumb rest; and keep a little more space between the wing, and the skin between my thumb and index. With the ledge, that was uncomfortable on both sides.

Charlie was eager to get me to try his standard thumb rest. Blade flew to the west coast, got surgery, and was back in my mailbox within a week.

Since then I’ve been experimenting with lowering my grip. I wouldn’t call anything I’ve tried a low grip. But lowering it just enough to make wrist movement easier seems to be all upside: esp, more relaxed looping stroke on both wings; also seems to help on blocks and pushes.
 
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says MIA
says MIA
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Ahem.

Sh players: how high do you hold your blade, and why? What about your thumb position?

***

An anecdote to get the ball rolling - feel free to skip and just discuss the above question.

I used to aim to keep my hand as high as it will go. This recently led me to get a handle with a thumb rest designed for that purpose on my BBC flashdrive: Charlie calls it a ledge, shorter and much steeper than anything I’ve seen on a commercial blade.

After a few weeks I couldn’t deny that most of my shots get better if I let my thumb sit a tiny bit lower on the thumb rest; and keep a little more space between the wing, and the skin between my thumb and index. With the ledge, that was uncomfortable on both sides.

Charlie was eager to get me to try his standard thumb rest. Blade flew to the west coast, got surgery, and was back in my mailbox within a week.

Since then I’ve been experimenting with lowering my grip. I wouldn’t call anything I’ve tried a low grip. But lowering it just enough to make wrist movement easier seems to be all upside: esp, more relaxed looping stroke on both wings; also seems to help on blocks and pushes.

I was doing the same then started to go a bit lower with more room around the wing just like you, and I'm experiencing the same positive results. I think that more wrist movement producing more relaxed and controlled strokes without losing any speed is the right path.
 
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I hold my racket to the point where the side of the middle portion of my middle finger rests on that curve when the blade head starts to open up and my thumb rests on that "bump" (?) on top of the handle. For forehand strokes, I slightly extend my index finger and raise it up just enough to control the ball, while the middle finger gets moved to the bend closer to the palm of your hand. For backhand strokes, I reposition my middle finger to the top bend part of your middle finger and my thumb raises towards the middle to control the ball.

I don't know if that was enough of a description to give you an idea of how I hold it, but I guess if you need clarification let me know.

I hold it like that because it allows me to control the ball in both directions (By alternating grips depending on where the ball goes) without having too much of a preference for either side (regarding grip). I give preference to my forehand side for certain shots, but I realized my backhand has good shots if I added more control to it. So I started looking up how professionals grip their rackets and learned about slight adjustments to your grip to accommodate both sides. I guess it's best to balance both sides when it comes to how you grip your racket; I know some players that have a backhand dominant grip and their forehands don't have control due to that position of the thumb, as well as not much control with the index finger, and vice versa.
 
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says Spin and more spin.
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Hahaha.

I have a friend. His name is Atanda Musa. He was better than all of us in his prime. Until Quadri Aruna surpassed him, he was the best "all time" African player for many decades. I think his highest world ranking was somewhere in the 30s or 40s but there are some articles that say he was as high as WR #18.

He holds his racket all the way down the handle right near the end of the flare. Wayyyyyyy down the handle.

About 8 years ago, I remember asking him about that. He said, "I can hold the racket however I want. It doesn't matter." hahahaha. His FH is flipping AMAZING. He is almost 60 and he still plays at an amazing level. :)

PS: In his prime, he took a match from Waldner. It was back in the 1980s. Not too many people can actually say that. :)
 
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says 2023 Certified Organ Donor
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I normally grip the bat in my base grip ALL the way up. Why? it is easy to get to that position consistently without thinking or trying. It is natural to me and feels right.

I DO however, make adjustments to grip unconsciously for certain shots.

I have been caught on tape adjusting my FH very much like the grip Carl described about Musa, I loosen my hand and drop hand down... I don't think about it, my hand feels the bottom of the flare end and some meat of my hand goes below... to a consistent spot I can feel without thinking... that is my extreme FH topspin grip. On reset, I loosen hand, drop down and wait a quick... bat drops right back into base grip without thinking.
 
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Hahaha.

I have a friend. His name is Atanda Musa. He was better than all of us in his prime. Until Quadri Aruna surpassed him, he was the best "all time" African player for many decades. I think his highest world ranking was somewhere in the 30s or 40s but there are some articles that say he was as high as WR #18.

He holds his racket all the way down the handle right near the end of the flare. Wayyyyyyy down the handle.
I googled the name and here's what the grip looks like:
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cache.php
 
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I googled the name and here's what the grip looks like:
cache.php

cache.php
One use of ST, sliding down the handle to vary grip looseness, down for ultra loose.

I am experimenting to chop or loop using this grip. The grip does raising my touch and spin very much. Useless for blocking or driving though, the blade (Defence Alpha) would naturally aligned to the blade movement. :)
306abe95f6a4850b088bcbbfa26c0acb.jpg


Sent from my I7D using Tapatalk
 
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One use of ST, sliding down the handle to vary grip looseness, down for ultra loose.

I am experimenting to chop or loop using this grip. The grip does raising my touch and spin very much. Useless for blocking or driving though, the blade (Defence Alpha) would naturally aligned to the blade movement. :)
306abe95f6a4850b088bcbbfa26c0acb.jpg


Sent from my I7D using Tapatalk

I’m guessing there are downsides to it, but some people also like the grip in your picture for low effort spin on backhand pendulum serves.
 
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says MIA
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One use of ST, sliding down the handle to vary grip looseness, down for ultra loose.

I am experimenting to chop or loop using this grip. The grip does raising my touch and spin very much. Useless for blocking or driving though, the blade (Defence Alpha) would naturally aligned to the blade movement. :)
cache.php


Sent from my I7D using Tapatalk

A guy at my club uses this grip with a combination of attack and defense and does very well with it. He's quite unpredictable.
 
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Der_Echte's comment nudged me into trying all the way up again. Looks like my short lived enthusiasm for holding the racket a little further down was just a sure sign that I needed to level up my wrist action.

Doing shadow work on my backhand, it felt like holding the handle further down put more strain on my wrist. I went back up the handle, and spent much of the week working on getting a much more fluid whip action between my backswing and my stroke.

I played 2-4 hours on 5 days this week. So improvements are starting to show on my backhand - and also on my forehand. I've got a very long road ahead until any of this gets committed to long term muscle memory. But I think this will be a fun one.. :)
 
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