CASE STUDY CLASS - HOW I BECAME A 4.5 PLAYER WITH MY LEFT HAND www.tennishacker.net/Tennis-improvement-system-optin

I saw this video at Macci's channel few days ago. Doing the unit turn he coils between hips and shoulders, so shoulders turn much further than hips. I didn't even realize that my body can coil this way. It took some time to get it going, but this coil gives you massive power. Same as back bend when serving.

I was in a really bad car accident that completely ruined my right shoulder and stopped me from playing tennis. I gradually changed my game and now hit with 2 hands on both sides and am finally able to serve and play competitive again

Amazing! Natural right hander learning leftie tennis! Great stroke!

If I might, looking at this video clip, I would focus on releasing the racquet and beginning the swing slightly earlier, so you have more time to be relaxed during the stroke.

I’ve learned so much from you. Bummed you got hurt, but it’s been wonderful to see you self diagnose (which is the most fundamental skill)

I think the first part as you describe it, inadvertently gave you a better stroke. Instead think, turn your shoulders more than your hips and just release your shoulders/upper body during the swing. If you use the current mindset, you may sometimes turn too much. (I tried this mindset) Also, when you play a match, you won't be able to turn much or set your outside leg on many tough shots, but you will be able to turn your shoulders more than your hips. This is an easy source of power with minimal effort. Once you feel it...the release..you'll wonder how you could ever go back. If you use this mindset, you won't need the second point you mentioned. It will be a natural flip. Lastly, loading the outside leg is not as critical using my mindset and this forehand can be effective from any leg position which is extremely useful in a match when you cannot get your legs under you. Federer and Nadal are masters of this. Watch how they can rock the ball with minimal effort and relatively little shoulder turn relative to the court. I have found this "turn the shoulders more than the hips" mindset works on the topspin backhand and forehand volley, too. I'm trying to figuring out how to do it on the serve, but not much success, yet. Good luck!

Richard, thank you for this video. It made a lot of difference in my forehand stroke. Looking forward to your other videos.

Thanks for sharing your story-transitioning from a right-handed player to a left-handed player. It’s truly inspiring. 💪🏾 I also love your channel. Cheers!!! What’s the name of your racket strings? I really love the color

I had a similar breakthrough on my forehand a few months ago, I think the term "racket lag" is a bit misleading, it's more of an "forearm and shoulder loading" I think (and possibly biceps if you load with a straight arm). It can be done naturally as you said, as a result of the upper body rotation, looseness of the arm and weight of the racket, but it makes sense that, for amateurs, the explosiveness of the leg push and torso rotation is not sufficient to get a full shoulder and wrist stretch, and "giving" the order to accentuate the so-called lag is quite beneficial. Unfortunately, from my experience, it's very hard to convert specific "commands" like this into muscle memory, and thus improving the strike when it matters the most. Commands in match would be "be precise, avoid mistakes" or "this ball is shot, it's an oportunity, strike it hard and find an angle" rather than "activate this muscle - now this muscle" or "I've trained 50 forehands in a row focusing on X, now let's try focusing on Y" which is my mind while training. Also the risk with adding some conscious commands to your technique is loosing some of the natural power your "body" knows how to generate by himself and can alter your timing. My best strokes are usually those where I feel I'm just "watching myself", meaning it's mostly non-conscious parts of my brain, various coordination neural networks, that have been trained since childhood, that are working using all the informations my senses gives at a pace that goes way beyond what I can actually process consciously. I feel conscious commands sometimes makes the move less fluid, less energy efficient in terms of biomechanics, and less adaptable to the slight variations your brain is capable of processing "on the go". Anyway, I had other similar breakthrough moments I couldn't really transfer to my game yet. Those are : exponential acceleration on the strike (start the stroke with a relative low intensity and increase muscle effort so that it's maximum at impact, increases whip effect). And wrist action on contact (intentionaly increase wrist lag and then consciously activate wrist just before contact, to get more control upon the spin and trajectory and increasing speed). I feed when I'm trying to add those in game, I loose something else (footwork, body transfer, distance to the ball, centering...) because I cannot focus on everything at once. I've seen coaches teaching that you get the best lag with a "dead arm", or "loose arm", but I think it's quite wrong, of course you should avoid being tense but, even though there are downsides to giving commands that target specific muscles during strike, there's no way you can be precise and consistent with a nuddle arm... I think the best analogy is hitting a nail with a hammer. Just like with a hammer, you need muscle energy from your arm to get the hammer into motion, and a mobile wrist to transfer some of that energy to have a faster angular speed, but with a completely loose wrist you're likely to hit your fingers or have the hammer move in your hand. You still need some control at the contact and additionnal "slapping" power. I'm looking forward how you'll manage to make your improvements a solid and reliable addition to your game :D Keep up the good work I love your channel !

This is absolutely brilliant and paradigm shifting for me. Thanks also to the interesting comments from the audience!

What you describe with the elbow is the elbow move in the golf swing, if you have your mind in the elbow driving the swing organizes it self around it. Do you work on a left arm throwing motion/? Baseball pitching training really helps with this movement, swinging a heavy but short rope does the same thing as you feel the inertia of the rope in the backswing to act against as the rear hip moves in the opposite direction, the fact the rope is not stiff like a racket makes the brain do the right movements because it is the only way to generate power.

Sorry Brice I I have to laugh when I hear your explanation of how you got more power and spin on your forehand. Why, because I have been trying out exactly what describe from you, the intentional supination of the forearm to create more racket lag. The success is impressive, for the first time I fell that I am really achieving this vibe effect , getting significant more spin and power on my forehand. I have to thank Steve from "one minute Tennis" for this. I am looking tennis videos for years and he was the first how talked about this concept. ALL other videos and trainers on you tube talking about hip drive etc. to initiate racket lag but this never happened to my forehand.

You are such a inspiration thank you

I think this is brilliant but so many "coaches" insist that it happen naturally and yes I suppose among very high-level players that is the case but like you I find if I consciously supinate my arm the result is so much better.

Nice video!! Congrats on the improvements Richard!

Always pleasure to watch and listen you Richard, I personally learnt from you a lot.

Gracias Richard 👏👏🏼👍🇪🇸

I’m a lefty, and now I’m gonna follow you.

Love it. To improve, learn and teach yourself.

Impressive stroke!

Richard, I'm a BIG fan (and I'm not just talking about my waist size here), so please - PLEASE - don't take offence from what I'm about to say about your **amazeballs** left-handed forehand, _BUUUUT..._ You'd do SO MUCH BETTER IF you just kept your HEAD DOWN, a la Roger Federer, with your brain-packed, British head CEMENTED to the contact point WELL AFTER contact. I'm definitely no measure of tennis success, certainly compared to you, but it has certainly seemed to me to work LIKE MAGIC as far as the quality of contact EVERY TIME I'VE USED IT, and the effect it has on EVERY STROKE you ever hit, IS OUTSTANDING. So please, Sir Richard, KEEP YOUR HEAD DOWN, and reap the rewards that The Tennis Gods bestow upon us mere mortals. Please? Thank you.

I have a machine too and I tried to learn a lefty forehand too. The main problem is the footwork. A real human does not play the ball at your likings.

4.5. Amazing, Richard! Is that self rating or based on match results?

What do you tell yourself to create the extension on your forehand?

similar/same as leading the stroke with elbow?

You need to try it in an match . What works in practice may not work in match against a human . Everyone is a pro against a machine