Improve Your Tennis – Serve

The concept of the serve is very easy—simply hit the ball into a box.  A good serve can definitely win you many more matches.  A couple years ago I did not practice my serve very often and focused mainly on volleys and putting more spin and power into my shots.  I thought playing consistently with power could win me more matches, but I was wrong.  That was when I realized how important a fast and accurate first serve was to my game.  I liked to put a lot of spin on my first serve and it tends to have less speed and easier to return, and my second serve was basically a slower first serve.  However, after losing some matches, I thought I needed more topspin on my shots, but I was not wrong.  Adding more topspin indeed made my opponents more frustrated, but I still lost important points—like 30-40 when I’m serving.  So that’s when I started to hit flatter first serves, and you know what happened:  I started to win matches after matches.

Having a faster first serve helped me mentally.  I no longer was afraid to simply hit the ball hard.  A good first serve tends to make my opponents feel much more nervous, because they did not know if they could keep their own service games.  Now I feel tennis is much more a mental game than before.  And “Just hit the ball!”

Here are the tips to improve your serves that I found very helpful (these are from personal experience):

1) Let go of the mental factor

Having a faster first serve is definitely great, but it is also important to have 100% second serves in.  If you       are keep worrying about double fault, then you can’t put everything you have into the first serve.  First             practice your second serve; the better the second serve, the more you are confident about your abilities.           Adding more spin to the second serve helps it go in.  Judge an opponent’s serve by his second serve.  If he       has a powerful second serve, then it is sure his first serve is good.

2) The toss            

Toss the ball higher.  With a higher ball toss helps your serve go in more and have more power.  However, a toss that goes thirty feet in the air is unnecessary.  Just throw the ball few feet above the highest you can raise your racket.

3) Aim the serve to your opponents weaker side

With my first serve I tend to aim for my opponent’s backhand because I know the return will tend to be high and easy for a overhead finish.

4) Serve with whole body not just arm

Bend your knees

Image via Wikipedia

Think about moving your body into the serve and not just your arm.  This gives much, much more power and speed.

5) Hit flat or with spin

Hitting a serve flat will generate more velocity and therefore harder to return.  However, hitting it with some spin is recommended if you want to get your opponent off guard and far off the court.

6) Hit the serve close to the line

If you often hit a serve that is short, it gives your opponent an easy time to return it.  Hit the serve close to the line and you will immediately notice the difference.

7) Serve and volley

When you want to serve and volley, hit a first serve with more topspin to give you more time.  Serve and volley is probably best used when you have a 40-30 lead to put more pressure on your opponent.  If you are good at volleying then you can do it whenever you want.

Double fault

This is the last tip I can think up right now.  If you do hit a double fault, it’s okay.  Shake it off and don’t think about the double fault.  I know this is extremely hard to do if the double fault caused you to lose the game or set.  However, if you don’t shake it off, your opponent will take advantage of the situation and you will have an even harder time the rest of the match.

9) Learn from failure and glory

Okay, I’ll finish it with this last important tip.  Each match you play is a good lesson to find out your weaknesses you can fix and shots you can improve.  Even if you won the match, there are things you can do better the next time.  Believe in the soul of the ball!

Be sure to check out other tips on “Improve your tennis.”  Good luck!