Teaching New Tennis Skills

Here are some ideas to help develop new skills in players:

• Use repetitions; players learn by doing – hit a lot of balls!
• Use progressions; for example you can break down the shot into parts such as shorter swings starting closer to the net.  Also practice individual shots before putting them together such as a groundstroke, approach shot, volley and then overhead!
• Add pressure; players need to develop confidence in the new skill.  Add some fun pressure and stress games and drills in practice!
• Repeat; players may need to repeat the different stages for the successful development of the skill!

For some sample drills to help your players learn new skills visit www.highschooltenniscoach.com!

 

Adjusting Your Practice Drills for Levels

Tennis can be challenging and at the same time frustrating for players.  Here are some ideas for your practice when dealing with different levels:

• Use targets in drills
  • You can adjust the size of the targets for levels and or use smaller targets inside a larger target area
• Use a variety of goals
  • You can change the “number goal” for levels.  For example one player may need to hit 60-70% of good serves while other players are trying for 50%
• Use a variety of feeds
  • Players can self-feed
  • Feed from same side of the court (toss-feeds)
  • Feed with or without spin

http://youtu.be…

http://youtu.be/e2GPmL2d5ZY

 

DoC521 Short Court Serve and Volley

This drill provides an easier way to develop the serve and volley tactic.  The server will start in no-person’s land and hit a 60-75% serve and then move in to volley.  The point is played out and then the players rotate one spot on their side of the court.  You can also add certain restrictions such as the return of serve must go crosscourt, no lobs, etc.  After a period of time the players on the return side will serve. This drill can be part of a series of progression drills to help develop this tactic and eventually players will move the starting point of the drill back towards the baseline.

Starting Your Season: Tips from a State Champion Coach

Here are four ideas from Coach Kevin Record (coached two FL State Champion teams) on how he approaches a new season.  After coaching high school tennis for over 15 years this is what works well for him.  These ideas or parts of the ideas may also work well for you and your team!

1.  Setting up a Budget/Team Dues

In many areas of the country parents now pay dues for their child to participate in a high school sport such as tennis. Setting up a team budget that includes trips, uniforms, match day refreshments, etc. will help set the dues structure (note: you can offset some of these costs with team fundraising, see ideas and examples on www.highschooltenniscosch.com)!

 2. Organizational Meeting

This meeting can set the tone for the whole season – be organized!  Have your practice and match schedule finished and handout to players and parents.  Explain your policies, expectations and how the line-up will be organized.  Ask for a “commitment” from your players (note: we make things easier for you with these handouts on www.highschooltenniscoach.com)!

H146 Team Expectation Meeting

H147 Team Practice Calendar

H148 Team Schedule Overview

 3. Line Up and Team Building

Coach Record uses a double elimination tournament to determine the boys and girls lineups. Usually the positions are set for the season, unless a player slumps badly or a player left out of the lineup makes dramatic improvement. Once this “stressful” time is over a team building session such as a cookout, giving out uniforms or fun trip is scheduled (note: the Team Manager function on www.highschooltenniscoach.com will set up challenge matches, tournaments and keep team and player statistics)!

 4.  Naming Captains

Captains play an important role for a team and their responsibilities can vary. Keep the communication open with your captains and make sure they know their roles and your expectations (note: a lot of our drills on www.highschooltenniscoach.com can be self-run, captains can also with the energy of the drill and practice)!

 Here’s a sample drill:

http://youtu.be/ajIFiOuCJJI

 Good luck with your season.  You can find other helpful information and free samples at www.highschooltenniscoach.com!

VC283 Volley Stations (doubles)

Here’s a practice set up using stations for a large group on a single court with the emphasis on volleys in doubles.  In a team practice the drill can be self-run allowing the coach to roam.  Each station works on a particular type of volley often used in doubles.  Here are the stations and the diagram shows spacing on a court.  You could also use this as a warm-up with quick rotations from station to station.  All the stations need to be co-operative; players are working together to improve and are not trying to hit winners.

Note: The video shows how the drill works for Station V but in this situation the players will be on a baseline and will not need to worry about the net.

Station I: First Volleys (deep volleys)

Each player starts in an alley close to the baseline and work on hitting co-operative first volleys to each other.  Emphasize footwork (split step and a weight transfer), racket angle (for more height) and a solid contact.

Station II: Crosscourt Volley

Depending on the level you can have players just hit either forehands or backhands back crosscourt or for more of a challenge players must alternative between the two shots.  Emphasize footwork (split step and a weight transfer), racket angle (for placement) and a solid contact.

Station III: Crosscourt Volley

See above

Station IV: Reflex Volleys

Two players start off the court standing just a few meters from each other and play reflex volleys back and forth.  Players can stand directly in front of each other and play either forehands or backhands or play to one side only for example a forehand to a backhand.  Or move players in opposite directions so their forehands line up and just play forehand to forehand (good for lower levels).  Emphasize keeping the racket in front (no swing) and a quick recovery.

Station V: Poaching Volley (controlled movement)

Two players start about 3-4 meters apart in the alley on the baseline. Players will volley back and forth as they move along the baseline to the opposite alley.  Once they reach the opposite alley they continue to volley as they move back across the court.  Emphasize fast feet and a controlled racket (for placement)

Station V sample video

Serve Tips and Handout

The serve is often a tough shot to learn with many high school players never able to reach a high level of competency. One stumbling block is often the grip – not being able to use the continental grip when serving.  One of your goals for the off-season for these players should be to serve with a continental grip to increase spin, power and consistency on their serves.  Here’s a handout explaining how to place your hand with references for a continental grip and other serving tips.  You can easily create handouts like this on www.highschooltenniscoach.com

Serve Handout

Perfect Practice makes Perfect

Many coaches are familiar with Vince Lombardi’s phrase “perfect practice makes perfect” and it makes sense, a lot of sense especially with tennis. If your players do not know what they are doing, i.e. “just hitting balls” often they are just perfecting an error and are putting a ceiling on their improvement.

The off-season is a good opportunity for your players to invest the time to practice right.  It will take a variety of time and effort depending on the player.  Some players have to pay a higher price with more practice time.  Players need expert coaching.  For both player and coach learning is a process.  There will always be new ideas, techniques, equipment, strategies, etc. As a coach investing time with your players and their improvement will ultimately improve your skills as well, it’s a win-win!

Mid-Season Practice

Here are some things to keep in mind when practicing during the middle or near the end of your season because there are some challenges keeping the practice fresh and motivating your players (and yourself).
1. Practice at Game Speed; add some variety with your practice by having shorter practices on some days but emphasize effort and energy level – “Game Speed”!
2. Set up a New Season ( or goals); new individual or team goals can help motivate your players
3. Play in the Now and Finish; you and your players can not change what has happened in earlier matches and practices (but they are learning opportunities). Learn from them and then move on, coach in the now! Love the game and what you are doing!

Tips from One of the Best

UNC’s women soccer coach, Anson Dorrance is one of the best.  His teams have won 72% of the NCAA National Championship games!  He has developed some core values for his players and you may be able to use some of these ideas with your team.

So with these things in mind let’s look at where we stand and our teammates stand with our core values.  First, measure yourselves against all twelve of them:  “how many of them do you live and to what extent?”.  Then measure your teammates against them.  (Obviously the freshmen just do a self-evaluation for now.)  The grading scale is “1” to “4” with “1” being “an extraordinary example of this core value and “4” means this person rarely embodies this core value or is the embodiment of an “over-bred dog” or whatever the negative opposite extreme of that core value is . . .

 

1. We don’t whine:  this tough individual can handle any situation and never complains about anything on or off the field.
2. The truly extraordinary do something every day:  this individual has remarkable self-discipline, does the summer workout sheets from beginning to the end without omission or substitution and every day has a plan to do something to get better.
3. And we want these four years of college to be rich, valuable and deep:  this is that focused individual that is here for the “right reason” to get an education.  She leads her life here with the proper balance and an orientation towards her intellectual growth, and against the highest public standards and most noble universal ideals, she makes good choices to best represent herself, her team, and her university.
4. We work hard:  this individual is the “indefatigable human spirit” and never stops pushing herself.  She is absolutely relentless in training and in the match.
5. We don’t freak out over ridiculous issues or live in fragile states of emotional catharsis or create crises where none should exist:  best example is the even-keeled stoic that is forever unflappable and resilient.  The worst example of this is the “over-bred dog” that high maintenance, overly sensitive “flower” that becomes unstable or volatile over nothing significant.
6. We choose to be positive:  nothing can depress or upset this powerful and positive life force, no mood swings, not even negative circumstances affect this “rock”.
7. We treat everyone with respect: this is that classy angel that goes out of her way to never separate herself from anyone or make anyone feel beneath her.
8. We care about each other as teammates and as human beings:  this is that non-judgmental caring and inclusive friend that never says a negative thing about anyone and embraces everyone because of their humanity, with no elitist separation by academic class, social class, race, religious preference or sexual orientation.
9. When we don’t play as much or we would like we are noble and still support the team and its mission:  this remarkably noble self sacrificing generous human being always places the team before herself.

10. We play for each other:  this is the kind of player that works herself to death covering for all her teammates in the toughest games.  Her effort and care (her verbal encouragement) make her a pleasure to play with and her selflessness on and off the field helps everyone around her.

11. We are well led:  this is a verbal leader on the field that is less concerned about her popularity and more concerned about holding everyone to their highest standards and driving her teammates to their potential.  This inspirational person competes all the time and demands that everyone else do as well!

12. We want our lives (and not just in soccer) to be never ending ascensions but for that to happen properly our fundamental attitude about life and our appreciation for it is critical:  this is that humble, gracious high achiever that is grateful for everything she has been given in life, and has a contagious generosity and optimism lights up a room just by walking into it.

Help for Your Tennis Courts; Repairs and more

SportMaster is a worldwide brand of acrylic sport surfaces for tennis, basketball, and other multipurpose applications.  With product distribution and representatives throughout the United States, SportMaster can assist high school tennis coaches, at no charge, with the following:

• Implement a tennis court maintenance program to meet any budget
• Diagnose tennis court problems from cracks and birdbaths, to surfacing issues
• Recommend cost effective repair solutions (some that can be performed by maintenance crews)
• SportMaster has a nationwide network of authorized installers that can provide free estimates or bid on tennis court repair, resurfacing, and construction projects.
• We can create a free, customized specification for repair and resurfacing of tennis courts.  This ensures “apples to apples” bidding from multiple contractors.

If you have any questions or would like our help with any of these items, please contact us:

Phone: (800) 326-1994 – Email: info@sportmaster.net

 http://www.youtube.com/user/sportmastercourt#p/u/7/ZUIvhdo9k44