C8L5: High Groundies

High ground strokes are probably the shot most players fear the most. In fact my strategy is for most of my juniors is hit high deep top spin to someone's backhand and wait for the short ball. Lets talk about this high deep shot. The problem with this shot is the problem perceived is that there is no power up around your shoulders or above your shoulders. The fact is this where the better players actually crush the ball. The best way I can tell you to do this is instead of trying to get some strength up there stick to your fundamentals. Instead of moving faster move slower. When you see that high ball think to yourself ok I see my 45 I am really going to stretch out slowly and deep out into that 45. Look at Warren he actually falls towards the hit. Most people try to get so much pace on this high ball they pull away from the hit while they are swinging because they speed up the hit. What you want to do is you really want to get out on this 45 we both know to do that. The best way to do that is to go deep and to go slowly into it once again if you speed up you are going to miss the hit. I can't emphasize enough the power of slowness when it comes to this high ball. Line it up don't worry about if you are going to get power or not. Bring your hips through, feel your coil and then feel your arm reach out and that edge of the racket stretch out to 45 degree angle. The power will be there remember I mean we are talking about a big body right 150, 120, 170 pounds on a 2ounce ball. If you can strike that ball with the correct geometry you will have a much easier time of creating power on this shot. The other thing is get that concave see how he is concave to convex you have to do that slowly or else it just gets very sloppy out there once again concave as he makes contact he goes slightly to convex. The real idea is to stretch out into the 45 which means don't yank your left hand and your whole body and your head to the left see that. On these high balls you see these guys digging deep and stretching out into the 45 during the hit before they let their body swing away. Don't get fooled by that optical illusion, when you see players body's rotate and even sometimes they may look like they pull off the ball during the hit right here see that he is leaning in and he is trying to get on the 45 as possible. So keep it slow, keep it slow on the high ball on both sides and you will find your power without looking for it.