G’day From The US Open,
The new statistical strategy product, Benchmarks, has over 400 data points to help take your game to the next level.
A key component of Benchmarks is the massive amount of “averages” from professional tennis, the collegiate game, and juniors. I want to share with you what I consider to be one of the most important data points in Benchmarks = what happens when you are serving and you either win the opening point to surge to 15-0 or lose it and trail 0-15.
Let’s dig in and see how we can learn from the data in Benchmarks.
COLLEGE MEN (266 Matches / 5703 Service Games / 33,137 Points)
Men Hold 72% of the time.
This is an ideal starting point. ( FYI, at the last several US Open tournaments, the men are holding serve 78% of the time)
Let’s round the college number to 75%, which equates to holding serve three out of four times. That’s an easy stat to get your head around.
Now, let’s take a look at how often they surge to 15-0 or fall behind 15-0.
- Moving to 15-0 = 61%
- Falling behind to 0-15 = 39%
I immediately see an opportunity to improve. Moving to 15-0 only 61% of the time feels too low. We can do better.
Now, how often do collegiate players hold from 15-0 or 0-15? This is the critical data that makes Benchmarks so powerful.
- Holding From 15-0 = 83%
- Holding From 0-15 = 54%
WOW! Surging to 15-0 helps you hold a dominant 83% of the time. So one point helps the server move from 72% (Love -All) to 83%. That’s a substantial bang for your buck.
Now, if the collegaite players drop to 0-15, they are only holding 54% of the time. That’s a massive difference between 83% (15-0) and 54% (0-15).
And…
If they fall behind 0-30, they are only going to hold serve 34% of the time, or about one out of three.
So, what can you do to hold more? Here are five things to focus on.
1: Make your 1st serve at Love All. This is not a time to go for low percentage aces to the corners. Prioritize the first serve in.
2: Aim your first serve at the forehand jam location of the returner. Jamming the returner here will extract a lot of return errors and not give them room to attack.
3: Look for a Serve +1 Forehand. Do this even if the ball comes back to your backhand. If you have time and space to hit a run-around forehand, then do it.
4: Take your Serve +1 forehand deep to the backhand side. Matching up run-around forehands vs. backhands works just fine.
5: Nothing wrong with finishing at the net if the ball is short. You are mixing high percentage patterns with aggression. You have got to go and take the initial point of the game. Your opponent is rarely going to give it to you.
SUMMARY
This Benchmarks “case study’ identifies some data points that can make a huge difference in your game. It helps you understand the importance of getting ahead and taking pressure off your service games. And we also covered the right patterns of play to do it.
Click HERE to purchase Benchmarks, which has 400+ data points just like this one to take your game to the next level. Enjoy!