Tennis Lesson

I've been taking tennis lessons since Ravi was taking them too, figuring I hadn't had lessons in a long time, and my game wasn't going much of anywhere in a long time either.

The first set of lessons I took were in a group setting, and it lasted five weeks. It reminded me of the kind of environment Nick Bollettieri has at his academy (Agassi, Courier, Seles, etc. all went to his academy). Kids run drills, hit a shot, get back to the end of the line.

I find that kind of hitting pretty stressful, because you have to get ready right away, then wait and wait, then hit again. It doesn't lead to getting your strokes "grooved", meaning, in a rhythm, so that you feel comfortable.

Over time, I began to think of these drills as more exercise, meant to get your movement down, and less about hitting the ball properly. If you hit the ball well, that's good, but if you miss, you just keep going on. Once you can forget about whether you hit it in or not, it works better.

Even so, we didn't get that much instruction. I found, as I was practicing, that my backhand isn't very good, nor is my serve. My serve has been improving some, mostly because I've been trying to get better technique.

During this time, Ravi would tell me about his lessons, which were also group lessons, and how his instructor would talk about throwing the racquet, and holding the racquet a certain way. I wasn't sure what to make of it.

Thanksgiving weekend arrived and our instructor decided to take the weekend to visit relatives and such and cancelled the lesson. So I decided to take a (pricey) private lesson. And it turns out the guy teaching that was Joel. Joel's got huge dreadlocks, and is pretty chatty, but gave a lot of ideas to think about.

In particular, he talked about throwing the racquet as well. What he meant was to let the momentum of the racquet do the work. That's an interesting visualization as people tend to "muscle" the ball, which causes their arm, ironically enough, to move slower, and this idea of throwing was meant to make it move faster, and more relaxed.

I should say that "throwing" isn't quite the right visualization. You don't throw it per se. Instead, as you swing the racquet, you let the momentum carry it through. The idea of throwing it means that you make sure the momentum is pretty high.

We also worked on simplifying my backhand some, getting down some, and again, letting more of the momentum do the work. I also did this on my serve, and the pace seemed a lot better than I was used to.

I think Joel's advice worked better than I expected partly because I tend to be over-analytical about my own shots. I'm sure some people hit and don't know what they do. I try to think about how I hit my shots, how my take back should be, and so forth, and tinker with it from time to time. Lately, for instance, I've been trying to emulate more of an Agassi backhand, which is short and compact, at least in the takeback.

I was also trying to work on the pronation of the wrist that people claim is needed for a good spin serve. It didn't occur to me to hit it with more of a forehand grip as I was more of a backhand grip player (having modeled it somewhat like Edberg's serve). It felt awkward, but the spin was reasonably good, so I was a bit surprised. I might have to experiment with that some more.

All in all, though the lesson was twice as expensive, it gave me some nuggets to think about.

Too bad it's getting cold. Hope I find some time to practice.