Mary booked a private lesson and arrived to be asked these two questions …”if you could improve one or two things today, what would they be? “
When she said backhand and serve, the second question was…”would you prefer that anything we explore today would be subtle and not damaging to brain cells?”
”Absolutely”, she said.
Mary had a one handed backhand but favored power over consistency. She opened up like Stan Wahrinka and was prone to mishits and wide to the right felonies. She used a continental grip but adapted pretty quickly when encouraged to try an eastern grip starting with the racquet pointed to the left side divider curtain.
Yes…we could have stayed with the continental, underspin friendly grip but Mary had a drive mentality which, with ball machine practice, should be easily transferable to the drill court and eventually the match court.
The goal was to give her routine feeds and have her hit inside out backhands from the right side of the court. We had her say bounce, smooooth on each ball after she had tossed me a couple while coaching me with these words.
In a few minutes, her mishits decreased and Wahrinka left the bubble. She described her backhand as “elegant.”
I respect Tim Gallwey’s term “Bounce, Hit” but think it needs to be tweaked for one who tends to overhit….rarely have I seen a player oversmooooth it in their quest for more control.
Mary’s goal was to take this elegant backhand to the ball machine and play inside out backhands.
After feeling solid with it, try doing 21 patterns with 2 inside out bh and 1 down the side and see if all three were elegant and non Wahrinka.
She also learned to drop and hit inside out but needs work on the toss which tended to be far too in front.
I’m looking forward to her feedback after the ball machine and will use the ball machine in her next lesson.
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