My Version of Brett Clarke Serves

Loved the video ! IMO the reverse spin variations are the most difficult to pick which I think should be the the case with corkscrew serves , but really liked the underspin / topsin variations. I will try to learn it as well.
right now I try to do it somewhat like stefan fegerel / yoshimura style ...

it was hilarious to watch you having trouble with your stock backhand serve though

I would do at least once in game play just to make sure the rhythm does not get lost from muscle memory. I have lost one of my good serves this way ... cant seem to get the timing back..

NextLevel said:

This month, I have decided to do no backhand serves and focus on my forehand serves. So it is partly a self-imposed mental block.

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Welp, I can't read your serves NL. So hopefully Brett adds you to the TTedge app so I can have a chance if I ever have to play you again.

As NextLevel and I know, some of the best serve, serve deception and serve tactics of forum members are the serves of Der_Echte. I would like to see Der_Echte doing a Der_Echte serve video. Then I would like to see the video where NextLevel emulates the Der_Echte serves.

Hahaha.


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+1 for Der Echte serve video !!!

Nice work, its really the best area to work on more once your foundations are in place you can win so many easy points. Even now with my game in pieces I'm still heavily relying on my serves to keep me competitive in matches (not much else is working lol). Keep working on them and you'll be 2500 in no time haha

I hope you don't mind NextLevel. I thought, rather than start a new thread, I would throw these on here:

Me doing a few serves between jobs. That's right. I'm wearing slacks and a button up shirt! [emoji2]



This second one, it is too bad the woman who filmed it didn't leave the camera rolling so we could see the last ball continue. Well, she's very nice but it took her a while to get that I did not want her to stop filming after each serve. But I am glad I got any. I can certainly see some things I can improve.

@UpSideDownCarl :

Quick question, on the short pendulum serve with side spin that hit the net , are you trying to bounce the ball closer to the end line on purpose to hide the length of the serve, whether it is short or long ?

UpSideDownCarl said:

I hope you don't mind NextLevel. I thought, rather than start a new thread, I would throw these on here:

Me doing a few serves between jobs. That's right. I'm wearing slacks and a button up shirt! [emoji2]



This second one, it is too bad the woman who filmed it didn't leave the camera rolling so we could see the last ball continue. Well, she's very nice but it took her a while to get that I did not want her to stop filming after each serve. But I am glad I got any. I can certainly see some things I can improve.

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ttmonster said:

@UpSideDownCarl :

Quick question, on the short pendulum serve with side spin that hit the net , are you trying to bounce the ball closer to the end line on purpose to hide the length of the serve, whether it is short or long ?

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In looking, I am not even sure that the one that is short that doesn't hit the net has a first bounce that is more than 1-2 inches closer to the net than the one that hit the net. But the answer to your question is, I don't really think about my serves like that. In truth, it is harder for me to serve when there isn't someone there on the other side.

When I was a kid I played baseball. I played a few positions. I played Left Field, 3rd Base, Catcher and I pitched. The small amount of coaching I had when I pitched was interesting. The guy was telling me to aim at parts of the batter. One of the specific instructions was: "Aim your high curveball at his head." It was a great direction because, until about 2.5 feet before the strike zone that ball looked like it was going to hit the batter's head. And not too many batters wanted to stand in there and wait for that to happen. But, right at about 2.5 foot away from the batter, the ball broke left and down sharply so that it was about stomach height and fairly near the center of the plate. With an 0-2 count on a batter I might throw that same pitch waist height, aiming for the catcher's glove hand shoulder which would be the outside of the plate. This pitch I would throw a little faster. And when I threw that pitch it looked like it was going to be dead center height on the outside of the plate. But a foot before the strike zone that ball would be inches off the ground and a few feet outside of the strike zone. So the batter would be swinging at air. I got a lot of strikeouts with that pitch that looked like it was going to be a meatball until the last second. My fastball tailed off to the left also, like my hook loop. And with the fastball I could make it tail up (a rising fastball) or down (a sinking fastball) by using a slightly different release. A lot of the times I would be aiming the fastball at the batter's hands or shoulders. Sometimes, at the knees. If wanted the pitch to be outside, I would be aiming for the center of the plate. If I wanted my pitch to be inside I would have to be aiming for the batter's body. And owning the inside of the plate is important in pitching because then you can own the outside of the plate.

When serving, a lot of the time I am just aiming for things like the opponent's switching point. But I don't really think about the first bounce too much. Perhaps I should. But I have to admit, I don't. I just think about where I want the serve to end up.

@UpSideDownCarl : I understand your comment about not consciously thinking about, and I infact have the same problem about not being able to serve as consistently on my own as with an opponent on the otherside. However, I start analyzing the serve if either I hit the net or miss the endline, and generally I think on those directions , where the first bounce is , whether I hit the ball too high, where the contact on the paddle was ... etc.

@NextLevel : Are you talking about the short underspin on the pendulum or reverse serve or both . For the hook , reverse serve I felt the first bounce was closer to the net for short topspin compared to the more underspin/pure side spin version.

@ttmonster: I actually want my serves to hit the net a large percentage of the time. If they do, it means they are probably low. I definitely hit a lot of nets. But I rarely hit the ball into the net and have it stay on my side.

Sure, it makes sense. For me , I have seen it happen sometimes automatically when the game is tight, without consciously thinking about it. The reason I asked was different, I had this theory in my mind that one can have two kind of short serve one that bounces closer to the end line and one that bounced closer to the net.

I just wanted to know whether you were practicing the first on purpose..

Again I might be completely wrong or did not get the correct perspective on the first bounce from the video ...

UpSideDownCarl said:

@ttmonster: I actually want my serves to hit the net a large percentage of the time. If they do, it means they are probably low. I definitely hit a lot of nets. But I rarely hit the ball into the net and have it stay on my side.

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Truthfully, I have to confess. I wasn't thinking about much of anything. After doing a bunch of serves to do something useful with the time between jobs, I decided to ask if one of the hostesses would video a few. At first she was filming one serve at a time. When I figured it out I asked her to make sure there were at least 3 serves per clip.

But thinking about this, something I realize, if I am going to serve short, I still want the ball to be moving fast. So I want the ball to have a long, low trajectory. It makes it harder to see what spin is on the ball and gives the person less time to react to the ball. And if you can get the ball to skid from the spin/speed issue, the is a much better serve. This also makes the spin/no spin factor much harder to deal with.

When I want to do serves so that someone watching can see the spin, to pull it back towards the net or to curve more, I will serve slower with a higher rounder arc. But I won't do that in a match because those are easier to return.

One thing about those nets, the net slows the ball down so, all of a sudden you have a better idea of how much spin is on the ball as it kicks to the side more and slows down more. But on the ones where they don't hit the net, I have enough pace so that the spin doesn't have enough time to overcome the pace of the ball.

This is useful. Unless I want a serve with a really big curve that is still fast so that it is hard to judge where to take the ball left to right, I kind of want the pace of the ball and the potential skid action to help hide the spin of the serve. All of this means, as low and long a trajectory for the length of the serve in question.


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