The Kick Serve (companion text to Cross's Physics paper)

Source file: The_Kick_Serve.docx.txt

Domain: biomechanics / serve-mechanics

Tier: reports/tier-1-high-value-gaps

Used in artifact: artifacts/reports/tier-1-high-value-gaps.md

Abstract

Practical companion to Cross's physics-of-the-kick-serve paper. Coaching cues and ball-toss mechanics.

Key points

Toss placement is the single biggest determinant of kick-serve quality.
Racket contact happens near the top of the toss arc.
Sidespin component comes from brushing across the back of the ball.
Topspin component comes from racket head tilt and rising arc.
Kick serve is hard to read because the spin axis is tilted, not vertical.

Raw dump (first ~1000 words)

The Kick Serve by thetennisbros | Apr 26, 2020 | Doubles Tactics, Serve, Singles Tactics, Tennis Tips | 2 comments The kick serve is something you see the pros do with such ease that we tend to take it for granted a little bit. However, if you walk out onto court and try to replicate the pro’s kick serves, you’re going to find it’s not that easy! Once you master the kick serve though, it offers some great benefits, particularly at lower levels, where your opponents won’t be used to dealing with it. They say variety is the spice of life, and it certainly helps in tennis, where the more skills you have in your locker, the more ways you have to put your opponent under pressure. If you’re relatively comfortable with the mechanics of your serve, then putting some extra time into perfecting the kick serve is an excellent idea and with a bit of practice, it’s eminently attainable. We’ve put together our guide to becoming a Kick Serve Buckaroo with super coach Dave Ireland to help you out, but we thought we’d give you some extra motivation and tips to get started! What is a Kick Serve? This video isn’t of the highest quality, but the kick serve from John Isner certainly is and it demonstrates all the things that are good about this technique. A kick serve is a serve where you brush up and over the back of the ball in order to achieve some important results: Good clearance over the net The ball dipping down into the box Moving laterally of the court Bouncing up above the opponent’s shoulders As you can see, Isner has nailed all these points with his serve, but even if you’re not 7ft tall, the kick serve can have huge benefits for your game. The kick serve is most commonly used on the second serve, but it’s also useful to mix in on the first serve, and is often used on clay and other surfaces that offer extra bounce. Like all the other spins, a kick serve is generated by the way the strings interact with the ball during contact. Your aim is to start contact around the inside lower part of the ball and finish over the top of the outside of the ball, generating the spin that will result in spin, but more about how later in the article. Why Use the Kick Serve? There are lots of reasons to implement the kick serve, and very few drawbacks. You will notice when you watch the top players on TV that they use it more often than not on second serves, and there’s a good reason for this. However, the kick serve is also effective on the first serve and can help you take control of the point. Margin for Error The kick serve works a lot like a topspin groundstroke in this regard. Because you’re hitting up and over the ball, you create that arc that gives the ball plenty of clearance over the net, but at the same time the dip that allows the ball to drop inside the court. This is particularly useful on the second serve, where we want to give ourselves the best possible chance of getting the ball in the court in order to avoid giving our opponent’s a free point. Top players very rarely hit double faults, and one of the reasons is the kick serve gives them the margin of error they need to maximize their chance of getting the ball in the court. Of course, they spend hours and hours practicing their serves as well, but they would find it more difficult if they didn’t have the option of the kick serve. It’s More Difficult to Attack If you imagine the perfect ball you’d want to attack it probably looks like a slow, flat second serve. It bounces inside the service line, doesn’t have much lateral movement and sits up nicely to be attacked. Now picture a kick serve. Sure, it still bounces inside the service line, but it bounces up viciously off the court, getting up towards shoulder height, and it moves laterally as well. This makes it far more difficult to attack, even for players that are used to facing kick serves. That’s not to mention the countless players at lower levels who are simply bamboozled by the way the kick serve moves off the court. Starting the point with the serve is a big advantage, but a weak second serve can hand that advantage straight to your opponent. If you can perfect the kick serve, then you’re going to make life much more difficult for your opponent and ensure they’re less likely to successfully attack your second serve. It can Open Up the Court Most players are quite adept at opening up the court with the slice serve but this only works on one side of the court. For the right-handers, that’s out wide to the deuce court, for the left-handers, it’s the famous leftie serve wide to the ad court. With a good kick serve you can open up the other side of the court as well though. For right-handers, the kick allows you to drag your opponent out into the trams on the ad side, and for the lefties, it allows them to kick the ball out wide to the deuce court. This opens up the space on the other side of the court to attack your next shot into. People tend to get carried away with power on the serve, but if you’re hitting big flat serves at your opponent, it often just means the ball comes back quicker, with more power on it. When you look at Roger Federer, you realize that placement and the ability to pull your opponent out of court with the serve is just as important as power. It Gives You Time to Get to the Net When we think of serve volleyers, we often think of big booming