Tag:US.Open

Andy Murray – 1st service with rather lower margin

The above numbers tell us that Andy's service margins are mostly (besides aces) quite below the ones of his closest competitors. It's mainly his excellent return and rally game that make him to such a successful player he is. From the technical point of view, as I personally see it, a limited pronation and a rather unclear distinction between the follow through 1 and follow through 2 are the reasons behind Andy's lower service margins. Interestingly enough, Ivan Lendl (1st serve 56%, overall service points won 66%) had similar issues in his career.

Mirjana Lucic-Baroni – Service 3.0 then a now

Already in the late 90's, Mirjana belonged to the most dominant serving female players on the WTA Tour as she was one of the first of them who really understood the efficient use of the pronation. On the photos from 1998 shown below is well visible how fast she was able to pronate with the integration of the body energy already in the age of 16 years

Angelique Kerber – rather unnatural leftie service

Angelique's service seems rather a bit unnatural as she was born right-handed and was switched to a left-handed player in her youth. In tennis in general and even more so in women's tennis, playing left-handed must be seen as quite a significant advantage and this is the reason why some parents and coaches with big goals switch their natural born right-handers to the left-handers at a young age, quite a typical example here is also Rafael Nadal (ESP)

Juan Martin Del Potro – Efficient 1st service 3.0

As a tall player of 198 cm (6'6''), Delpo has quite some power potential, which he is using in all of his strokes. His body parameters and solid technique make also his service to a dangerous weapon, despite partly missing one distinct element common to the very best servers of the history. His career service statistics (until the end of 2016) are quite impressive - in the total of 5563 service games - 3272 aces (against 1100 double faults), 64% of the 1st services in and 74% winning percentage on the 1st service points.

Denis Istomin – Solid service 3.0

Denis, who is being trained by his mother Klaudiya Istomina, possess quite solid and efficient stroke technique and his service fulfills all the requirements of the Service 3.0, which stands for service played with optimal body energy integration. Some details of his service can be seen on photos from the 2016 US.Open shown below:

Genie Bouchard – Service details

Genie's service, in particular, didn't get so much attention yet, but despite some improvement possibilities concerning mainly the increase of its margin, it has a lot of good aspects, mainly around the body energy integration into the stroke. Genie mostly gains quite high percentages out of her serving points.

Frances Tiafoe – American tennis hope – service remarks

With his 1st service, Frances could have quite a potential weapon at his disposal (after all his fastest service during the 2016 US.Open was clocked at 142 mph, same like the fastest service from John Isner), but small details are in my opinion often taking a bit away from its potential. The main issue is for me in the rather suboptimal integration of the body energy into the stroke in the moment of impact at most of Frances' services.

Garbine Muguruza – 1st service 3.0

Tall Garbine (182 cm / 6'0'') can consider her serve as one of her weapons. The photos from her practice during the 2015 US.Open show that Garbine well fulfills the requirements of the Service 3.0.

Samantha Stosur – Service varieties of the probably best female service kicker

Here the distinction between her typical first service (usually more or less direct with just a slight topspin) and her famous kick service (heavy topspin with some sidespin used mostly as a second service) are quite visible. In both varieties, Samantha spends almost the entire stroke energy on the dominant (right, in her case as a right-handed player) side. The "follow through 1" (= the active part of the follow through) of the kick/topspin serve then goes, besides other differences to the first service, much more to the right.

Naomi Osaka – Japanese tennis prodigy – service analysis

Naomi correctly fulfills all the essential Service 3.0 (of Tennis 3.0) requirements. Certain distinct improvements bringing higher margin and better efficiency would be still possible though. Some of the main aspects to work on are mainly around the rather arm-power forced pronation, which is quite normal when proper pronation was introduced to the player later in the career but should still become a bit more fluid (with better contraction-relaxation coordination) over the time to make an optimal....