video of my serves

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There are different view points to what constitutes a good serving motion, but from what I can tell looking at your videos :
1. In case of your hook serve, looks like your toss is going behind your body, so watch out!
2. Do not pull your left leg up so high , you definitely can stomp but make sure you do not injure your knee or ankles apart from losing your balance and consistency. Concentrate on more weight transfer during the contact does not look like you are doing that you are serving more from the arm , from what I have seen 2400+ players with hook serve their motion is very small but the generate a lot of spin from the hip and the weight transfer.
3. Also , to address the "high" part you need to contact the ball lower ... automatically the server will go lower.
 
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I agree with ttmonster to an extent. His points are all good. Your service is however illegal. The ball must be at rest prior to the toss and cannot be moved horizontally as it must be tossed in an upward fashion. It must also rest on an open or flat palm rather than a cupped palm. Your service isn't that bad, but as it's been said you're serving a little too high over the net. Don't concentrate on your 2-3 bounces for service. A short service is only good if it is low to the net. Any service short or long is harder to attack if it is low to the net. Any service that is high over the next immediately makes it easier to attack. If you can serve 0.1 - 1 inch or 1-25 mm over the net you are doing a great job. Those are the services that people will misjudge and thus give you a nice third ball attack.
 
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Indeed, the serve is maybe illegal. You let it bounce on the table and throw it in the air right after. Just a small adjustment to let it rest in your palm first I think. Many top players don't use a cupped palm btw and they never get called illegal for it. It is no problem if you cup your palm a bit to prevent the ball from rolling off your hand :p
 
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All comments so far sound good. This is what I notice.

1) With many of your serves the contact point is obstructed by your body even from this angle on the camera. That means that to a person standing at the table, probably most of your serves are being contacted with your body obstructing the view of the ball contacting the racket. That would be another way in which the serve is not legal. Your body cannot be in between the ball and the view of the person you are serving to.
2) I would toss the ball higher. 1 foot higher, 2 feet higher would be fine. 3, 4 or 5 feet higher would start giving you a decent amount more spin. Some of your tosses are high enough to be legal but not high enough to help your serve. Some of your tosses might not even be high enough to be legal. Some of your tosses go up only a few inches when they leave your hand and many of those you are contacting before they drop more than a few inches. You are contacting the ball very close to the top of the toss. This is also related to what ttmonster said about contacting the ball lower so that you can keep the ball lower.
3) To me this is probably the biggest issue that I saw, or heard. It sounds like your contact with the ball is too direct. Your racket is making a sound like you are hitting into the ball. That means you cannot be getting too much spin. It sounds like you need to get the edge of the ball more, let the rubber grab the ball but not let the ball sink all the way in to the wood. This way, when you accelerate the bat speed by snapping your wrist you will get more spin rather than speed.

As far as presenting the ball, there has to be a point where the ball is motionless and the opponent can see the ball being presented before you toss it, and the ball has to be in your palm, not touching your fingers. It is true many pros cup their palm, but the opponent has to see the ball. And it is also true that, technically, you are supposed to present the ball with an open palm and the hand flat and the ball is supposed to be in the center of your palm. So both Mr RicharD and WiWa are accurate.

Also, even though you are lifting your leg, it does not look like you are getting much body into your motion. Perhaps having your knees a little more bent to get a little lower to see if you can get the weight transfer and the hip a little more into the action.

I would work on keeping the contact point and the serve low, doing a considerably higher toss, letting the ball fall before contacting it, making sure that your body is not obstructing the view of the ball, making sure you are presenting the ball before you toss it, and trying to spin the ball more. A way of testing this is to try and do straight underspin serves where you are trying to get the ball to come back to the net. If you do a serve and it is really slow and comes back to the net, that is a start. If you can do a serve where you are not really slowing it down and you can get it to spin back to the net because the spin overcomes the speed it has decent spin.

All this being said, the basics of your serves are good and the adjustments should be easy your are doing the fundamentals quite well.
 
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Hi=)
I think the serve is always the same. You ut it in the same spot if the table, the same spin. Try to put it short in forehand, put more spin to it or less spin. If you put in the same spot all the time your opponent will looking forward to recive your serve. And it´s not supose to be that way ;) Keep Working!

I'm serving diagonally intentionally b'coz my camera's there and I'm deliberately serving them there. I serve my reverse to the short FH most of the time. Also I think I've succeeded in disguising the spin hehe.... because quite a number of them were heavy side-tops and heavy side-unders for both the normal and reverse serves, it doesn't look obvious from the video but it would be in matches. :p
 
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Thanks for all the comments! This is why I love posting videos on forums like this, especially when everybody has an attitude of encouraging fellow players. :)

I think I will work on a proper toss(open palm, showing the ball before it is bounced), higher toss(above my eyes at least), even more waist action (i thought i was using a lot until i recorded the video!!!), and even better control of the 1st bounce. I think my 1st bounce should be even more nearer to the net to make it shorter and lower. Hehe I don't even realise that I'm lifting my leg so much until i recorded the video!!!!:mad:

Regarding the hiding of serves, I think I'm stretching the limits but I take away my free arm just before I hit the ball, and the contact point is visible to my opponents.

The reason why I'm hitting into the ball a lot, is that my rubbers are 2 years old, and don't have any tackiness left. I'm forced to dig into the sponge to produce max amounts of spin. I don't want to use my new bat in hitting in the garage because it's such a waste coz the tackiness would be gone in just a few sessions(lots of dust there).

Anyway thanks for all the advice!
 
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Regarding the hiding of serves, I think I'm stretching the limits but I take away my free arm just before I hit the ball, and the contact point is visible to my opponents.

It does not matter if the arm is out of the way, if some of your contacts are blocked from the view of the camera at that angle then there is no way the receiver, standing at the table can see them and a lefty, even less. It happens more with your reverse than with the regular. If you pause the video at the contact point of the serve that starts at 17 seconds in the second video (the contact point is still at 17 seconds) you will see, your arm is in between the camera and the ball, and when you contact the ball, your racket and the ball are behind your body. Truthfully, it does not matter if it is your arm or your body that is in the way of the ball. Nothing can be in between the ball and the eyes of the opponent. If your contact point is hidden by your body, even when your arm is not in the way, that is still against regulations.

I only looked at two. I am sure if I went through the video I could find many more where contact is made while the bat face and the ball are obstructed by your body.

But, again, all in all, the serves are solid and the most important thing, in my opinion is the higher toss and what ttmonster said about contacting the ball while it is lower.
 
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I was looking again, many of your tosses in that second video go behind your head and many of them when they fall are still behind your body. I believe that even that would be considered obstructing the opponent's view of the ball when it just goes behind your head but then is visible again when you contact it. But with several of the serves, when the bat hits the ball, the ball is still obstructed from the view of the camera by your body.

Easy to change that though. And since the serves are good, no worries.
 
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@blahness : as richard pointed out you are having trouble in keeping the ball visible during the hook serve. You can try to do what I do ... rotate the entire body during the contact , that way your left shoulder will move away and couple of advantages 1. you will get more body in the serve , this actually makes the amount of spin deceptive
2. you will be in ready postion quicker
speaking of which , I would suggest when practising serves try to get to the ready position after each serve , it helps to have the practice . Otherwise , during actual game sometimes you will get stuck and the opponent can sneak in a push to your wide back hand which you won't be able to return.
 
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gahhhh it's so hard to change.... the habits are already ingrown...

I know what you mean. When I first learned to serve you were supposed to keep the arm there to help hide the contact and when the contact is nice and close to the body, the way you get it, blahness, it actually helps the spin and power of the serve. :) So, figuring out how to keep the contact close to the body but not behind you so that your opponents can see the contact will actually be a challenge. But, you can do it. I am sure of that. And, by practicing your serves you are utilizing the best method for changing old habits.

By the way, I have been told to practice getting into the ready position after the serve too and I never do if I am just practicing serves. I should, but...when I practice getting into the ready position, is during serve and receive drills. I think it is important to practice your serves that way as well.
 
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1) Almost all your serves are blocked body body, and some of them by arm as well.

2) You make much direct solid impact to the ball. Thsi is good for disguising topspin, excellent for making a knuckleball, and OK to make a light cut, but is not very good for generating the heavy spin when you need it. You need to graze the ball more to achieve this. A higher ball toss will help a lot as well. If your rubber is too slippery, clean it with some Olive oil and Lemon juice. This is not tuning, it is cleaning and restoring the original properties of your topsheet, which got altered by the dust in your garage.

3) You need more racket speed at impact to get more spin. You are using too much arm trying to generate your racket speed. You really need total body muscle help and a relaxed arm and wrist to get that blade speed and ball spin.

4) You strike the ball entirely too much downwards at impact, that gets all these high bounces that are too easy to get you killed.

5) You are WAY too upright during your motion.

6) Your ball toss does not give you a chance to get you timing or body weight transfer going with the current way you serve. Toss the ball higher, wait for the ball, then do the serve, you will get better spin and it will still be easy to learn the timing.

7) For a short serve, get the first bounce just a little closer to the net. Try to get the double bounce to happen near the opponent's endline to reduce the possible angles of return. As it is now, your short serves are too shot, which opens you up to more extrem angles and the height makes it too easy for a rookie to slap it by ya.

8 You seem to serve with a plan and that is one of the purposes of serviving, to gain an imeiate offensive advantage.
 
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