Tennis Serve Tip: How To Bend The Elbow Properly 

Absolutely nailed that advice - great video. Its so easy to misunderstand the serve mechanics from half-serve to racket drop. I find that when the elbow bend is done correctly, the whole motion feels very fluid and effortless...you can feel the momentum take over.

Fantastic advice. You are one of my two favourite tennis coaches on RU-vid and #1 for the serve. I just looked at a slow motion video of my serve and I am “guilty as charged”. I look forward on focusing on your tip to see what impact it can have on my serve. 😊

2:14 Right vs wrong way comparison 4:22 How to practice the right way Thanks for this detailed instruction. I saved all 3 videos from you on the topic and will use them to work in this. Filmed myself and noticed the error.

Great video. i am aware of the racquet path on the serve. When you are a self taught player, sometimes you struggle and you are unable to diagnose on your own. As of late, I have struggled with power and consistency on my serve. This has broken down where I believe I am missing in the process. Also, dare I say, it seems like your explanation simplified the actual movement, which is great. Keep up the good work and thanks very much.

Hello, This is the best tip I have ever had in tennis serve. Thanks

Just been studying this and trying different practice drills from different videos. I put a ball in a long sock and practiced the ball swing drill in this video: "6 Drills For Improving A Shallow Drop In A Tennis Serve" (at 2:52). That's what so far seems to work best for me, to quickly build up the muscle memory for this movement.

Respect for the lad training his serve while its snowing!

Federer is a good example of this. Thanks.

This is a terrific tip I definitely think I’m guilty of improper elbow position. Thanks!

Very useful. I’ve seen many videos talking about servers, but rarely focused on this tip. It is the same technique with ‘the birthday hat’ from Ryan.

This was a killer video. Nicely done. It can be so hart to figure this out just on your own!

First-class video!👍I think that keeping the wrist bent inward and at the same time pointing the racket strings slightly upwards to the sky will do the trick and rectify this common problem. Raonic and Djokovic can be observed doing this on their serves. Starting with the edge of the racket facing directly upwards along with not having the wrist bent inwards encourages the wrong elbow move. I am not a tennis coach but I noticed this phenomenon on my serve, which makes all the difference. Relaxation and looseness are also guaranteed.🎾🎾🎾🔊🙂

Best ever tennis Lesson on serve.Thanks immensely

Perfect, 4.3 player and you just made me a 4.5 71 year old!!

Excellent, I could totally see myself in your student's action!!

I’m discovering this action with great success. For those who really struggle with serve please note that the focus here is on shoulder and elbow. Relax everything else - no wrist action required until your phase with hitting the ball

Excellent. Very valuable tip about the 🎾 tip!

Thank you this clarification was important for me. Did it the same way as your student.

Love it. Such a simple and effective method to improve the serve. Many thanks for this video

Hey! Thanks for the tip. I'm having exactly this type of problem -- the drop is shallow. With your technique I'm really scared to hit myself in the forehead -- as I almost did couple of time while trying to find the right angle of bending my elbow.

Great tip! I'm just begining tô understand why my serve is só bad and I'm improving with the feel of bending the elbow. Even my smashes are better. Thank you very much.

Fantastic tip, you really are helpful. Thank you.

Thanks,great help as always. The bottle trick was a big eye opener for me. Can't wait to practice this one!

There is a video from the inventor of the ServeMaster training device that helps correct the serve elbow-racket looping motions. The key is to not have a death grip to free up the wrist and to allow the momentum of the racket to do the work. Done correctly, the elbow bends naturally, just as you recommend. In lieu of the training device, you can try holding the butt of your tennis racket grip with just two fingers and thumb and work up to about 50% speed shadow swings in front of a mirror, focusing on making smooth hitch-free racket loops and accelerating smoothly from the coiled, loaded position. Then three fingers and thumb up to about 75% speed and power with shadow swings. Then full grip at full speed. If you regress and overtighten your grip and lose the smooth continuous looping accelerating motion, just fall back to the 2 or 3 finger training. My problem is inconsistent elbow draw back, which I remedy by imagining drawing a Kyudo bow for a snap shot at the ball. In traditional Japanese archery the draw hand goes behind and above the ear, similar to the trophy position. In archery the elbow is drawn back in line with the shoulders in a T-form. More flexible elite players draw the elbow beyond this T-form for extra coiling tension, but this might be too extreme for the rest of us.

Great instruction. I’ve been doing it all wrong. Will try tomorrow

This is great, one single element that makes or breaks it [for me]. I have the problem exactly at the elbow bending. Thanks a lot, will try shadow to gain new muscle memory right away.

great video, great tips to learn, plz i have a question about tennis court in your town, is free to play tennis there or it's a club you have to pay? how much?

Great explanation, James! Very helpful advice!

Like winding up to throw a baseball. Great points! Looks as if the correct drop is away from the body as opposed to down the back. Is this a product of cocking (supinating) the hand full stop? Or from pointing the elbow forward?

Perfect video. Very very useful and important. Thanks.

Really a great video on a serve nuance that can be overlooked. Thanks.

This is GREAT stuff! You really know what you are talking about.

Amazing Instructor!!!!

Good tips James

Thank you for addressing this issue. I have been mistakenly moving the racket from right to left while maintaining approximately the same angle at the elbow, and could not understand why I couldn't accelerate the racket to the ball.

A good tip that helped me was to imagine you are wearing one of those birthday party cone hats and knocking it off your head with the racquet.

Thank you, for this Excellent tip! I recorded myself and notice I have the same exact mistake in my serve. However, unfortunately it has become a muscles memory for me :( . How to unlearn this bad move?

In my case, I have a classic "waiter's tray" issue in which my palm opens up and the strings face the sky. During shadow swings without the ball, I can easily recreate the racquet drop on edge but when the ball strike is involved, it all goes to 💩

very good expplication!!!!! Thank you very much!!!!, could you please tell me where to throw the ball, it's always something I have a hard time with!!!, I'm a fan from Argentina, I greet you very cordially.

Confused about something. Does the "right to left" movement end at the trophy position when the elbow angle is most closed ("hand over bicep")? And after that position is reached, what initiates the racquet drop and is the drop active (like the right to left movement) or passive as a result of leg drive, hip rotation, etc? Thank you.

Great tip!!!!

So the elbow should be low, not high as is depicted in the “trophy position”??? Thanks for anyone’s feedback on this.

The racquet drop should be initiated at trophy position, when the upper arm and forearm form a roughly 90 degree angle, i.e. 90 degree elbow flexion. The common error is to arrive at trophy position with too much of a straight arm and begin the elbow flexion too late (when hitting arm has already dropped behind the back). Is that the idea?

james you had a video on the serve that addressed keeping your chin up during the serve (quiet eye) I haven't been able to find it is it still posted?

Gonna try this, I’ve been practicing serve every day for 2 years and it’s becoming frustrating because idk what I’m doing wrong

Another good tip. Will work on it. Thanks.

Great instruction, maestro 👍

It is impossible to control when you “break your elbow” on a serve as its one synched motion. Does a baseball or football player think of “when to break their elbow” when throwing ? Rick in your video simply just doesn’t have the shoulder flexibility, and his body is moving before his arm - his “kinetic chain” is slightly off

Another perhaps vital difference I see at 2:44 is that your elbow is stretched out and back from the chest as far as it can go, which seems not to be the case with the other fellow.

Great great way to explain it from the don't and the proper 👏👏☑

Where does James coach? Surely gotta be somewhere in UK, I'd love to get on court with him and for him to sort my serve out.

do we lift the racquet with the forearm will create bend in arm or we deliberately bend arm?thanks for your videos and explanation

Thanks so much for this inciteful tip. I am pretty sure I am guilty and will begin the long process of breaking an ingrained habit. I personally was not successful in Gregg's first 30-day service challenge despite putting in the time. I am much better now, but it takes me a long time to modify incorrect technique. I am pretty sure you will suggest a thousand shadow swings. I would be interested in your advice on how to correct an incorrect swing path. I also have trouble with the toss and when I begin to focus on a piece of the swing, the problems with the toss are exacerbated. Do others have similar problems? Advice?

Great advice! I noticed your hand remained over your right bicep as your shoulders rotate up to the ball. Am I correct? What should your feeling be, or what move do you make, after your hand arrives over your right bicep? Thanks again.

Spot on! Thanks for this.

Thanks!!!

After bending does the elbow move towards ball from bottom of drop with that less angle then arm straighten, or does arm start straightening from bottom of drop

robert is dedicated, out there in the snow

i looked into some good servers: I tried to look at smaller angles in elbows (like your video) and servers who stay 90degrees. Karlovic - does as you say Isner - does it a bit as you say Roddick - solid 90° Raonic - pretty much 90° Marlin Cilic - does as you say This list is in no terms complete. Nor is my biomechanical analysis.

Thank you!

Great tip!

hi, Why does my racket hitting my left leg after serving?

Thanks for the Great video coach!!!

Wow...appreciate the detail!!!

I'm curious what region you're from, as some of your pronunciations remind me of aspects of American Appalachian / Southern accents, as distinct from New England, Midwestern and Middle Atlantic accents. I believe the Appalachian and Southern areas were mainly settled by Celts -- the Welsh, Scots, and Northern Irish, whereas the other regions were settled early by the English, the Dutch, Germans and Scandinavians.

In terms of the ‘Actual timing’ when do I bend my elbow? Assume my ball toss is within the normal accepted height James, when do I commence the elbow bend? This is something I struggle with?

Brilliant 👏👏👏

that's exactly my problem, i dont bend my elbow so that end of shadow racket drop

Great stuff👏👏👍

Very good explanation James

All i can say is, "BRROOOOOO!!!"

Show 👏👏👏👏

Like saluting

That student on the left needs to work some things before even getting to bending the elbow. If you look at his "racquet pointing to right fence" position, you see that his wrist is firm. He is gripping the racquet like a hammer when it should be barely hanging in a limp wrist as we see in the instructor's case (Imagine throwing a tennis ball. You wouldn't be squeezing that ball with a death grip. Your fingertips would be barely preventing it from falling). He may follow the elbow bend lesson, but without changing his hammer style to a whip style he will never see any benefit.

💪💪💪

me no bend thanks coach

If I understood this clip from the tennis channel, Intuitive Tennis (ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-jx9k2Gik7Nk.html), there are two ways to achieve the racket drop. The second way, used by Sampras, Roddick and Federer, seems to violate your advice about the elbow/arm angle. Can you please clarify?

I've watched 100s of videos my serve still sucks 😂

WRONG!! Just look at Sampras...its not magic...he does it that way cuz its the RIGHT way to do it...not because he is a pro and we are club players. The right way is the right way.

This makes such a big difference in generating power. There are days when my serve is off and I couldn't figure out what the problem was. This was the main issue. Thank you!

I might spoil the party... pardon. I'm afraid to analyze racquet drop or anything limited just to the arms, hands, wrist, shoulders apart from the legs (not necessarily well pronounced leg drive just the starting impulse from the legs) is misleading. I share Macci's belief that the leg drive initiates the racquet drop nothing else. Can it be done the way its shown in this vid? Sure. That was a sound serve. Could it be done better with the leg drive first? I guess yes it would. I'm amateur hence regard my views with caution. Best regards

The fact that you explained the source of that sharp drop behind the back is so golden. I have wondered WHY I do this and now I know not only why but how to fix it. Everywhere I go now it's like 'sixth sense' I see high elbow people.

Great tip, this is something that I have always wondered about with my serve. I see now I will have to work on getting a bit more bend in my elbow, thanks!

Also, these movements are occurring in a split second, so how do you suggest drilling for the correct right to left movement?

Do you also give real life serve training/workshops?

Thanks a lot 👍

I love how you teach

This bend (the where and when you do it) is far less important than you realize. Physics know-how in connection with human biomechanics will give you the proper insight. However, tennis instructors are too busy teaching what they think they know - than learning what they clearly do not know.

Strong tips....

Great tip.

I have this problem and been trying to fix it, but i always revert back to the wider elbow angle. Any advice would be great.

Gracias

The elbow bend isn’t the key. In fact, it may be causing your low elbow flaw. Bending the elbow too much is basically the old scratch the back concept. It is about the timing of the forearm supination. If the forearm supinates the elbow can remain at or close to 90 degrees and you’ll be in a stronger position at the bottom of the racquet drop.

❤

Is it okay to not decrease the elbow angle of 90 degrees if you do not break at the elbow like James showed? In other words can you still perform a full service motion right to left with a 90 degree angle at the elbow or is that going to be detrimental either in loss of power and or risk of injury

very good!

You have solved my high elbow in this short video. Thanks so much

This is great video! You address issue so hidden, yet so important!

Great explanation! Very useful!

Great tip ! Thank you