Push Syndrome

Ignore this syndrome at your peril, for it is ubiquitous, very destructive to your consistency and easy to diagnose and cure. It should always be the first thing you think of when you are hitting the topspins tall and slices short. It applies to all groundstrokes and the volley. Pushing is born out of an unquenchable desire to control the ball, and yet it is the enemy of control.

Pushing Through

Basically whenever you try to add power or spin through the moment of contact you will send the ball spinning off in the wrong direction. You lose control of the ball due to the dark side of impulse (the injection of directional momentum into the ball via force applied at the moment of contact). As an example, if you forcibly drive the racket face up through the ball to achieve more topspin, you elevate or steepen the force vector applied to the ball which redirects it up over the baseline.

Pushing is born out of an unquenchable desire to control the ball and yet it is the enemy of control.

The direction off the impulsive force is the key. It is just fine to have the racket head already moving at constant speed in any direction at the moment of contact - that does not change the direction of the ball. If the racket is accelerating at the moment of contact, however, there has to be a force behind it, and that force will redirect the ball. Only two forces should be on the racket at the moment of contact; an impulsive, control force that you direct along the desired flight path of the ball and a rotational spin force tangent to the direction you want the ball to spin.

The bottom line is this. You need to relax and "let go" in the instant immediately before contact with the ball.

Rotational and linear forces don't interfere with one another, so you can easily use stored forces to add extra spin and control. Both of these forces should be stored in the forearm muscles and reserved for adding control and spin to the ball, not guiding the racket head or adding pace. Stored forces should be perfectly counter-balanced by the inertia of the accelerating racket head until just a few milliseconds before contact when a sudden dip in the power wave stops the acceleration, releasing the stored forces from their inertial prison. That way the released control forces are maximal at the instant of contact but their effect on the velocity and orientation of the racket head are minimal because the stored forces have had only .05 seconds to accelerate the racket head. Understand - the racket head is already moving - very fast sometimes - but its speed needs be constant at the moment of contact. You must NOT be "pushing" the racket head through the ball because "through-the-ball" is not in the same direction as the desired flight path of the ball. Through-the-ball is a direction that depends on the type of spin you are trying to create, where the backswing starts and the follow through ends, etc. The desired flight path is not the same as the direction the racket has to go to meet the ball, therefore the only "pushing" that should happen during the moment of contact should result from the stored force in the forearm being released and injecting the appropriate directional control and spin into the ball.
    Push Syndrome
  • Chief Complaint
    • "I have zero control!"
  • Symptoms(Sx):
    • consistently long balls on topspin or net strap balls on slice
    • no "grab" of spin
    • occasional shots buried into the net on topspin or way out long on slice (compensation)
  • Signs(S):
    • snap but no pop
      • lock and load OK
      • lag OK
      • NO explode
        Pathophysiology(Px):
      • forces stored but not released
        • pushing through the moment of contact
        Diagnosis(Dx):
      • query the racket note
        • should ping or pop
        • Treatment(Rx):
      • step in early
        • and push back before moment of contact
      • relax completely at the end of the lag
      • relax into the ball
      • let the racket do the work
      • listen for racket note on contact - should ping or pop
      • Make sure to stop shoulder rotation before the moment of contact
    • dragging balls up and out or down and out
      • attempting to create spin at moment of contact
      • adds impulse in the wrong direction
        Pathophysiology(Px):
      • pathological need to control
        • illusion that efforts to control the ball are more effective later in the stroke
        • well deserved self doubt about proper execution of the stroke.
        Diagnosis(Dx):
      • query your body
        • arm pain
        • back pain
      • query your mind
        • trying to regain control
        • Treatment(Rx):
      • trust the force
        • believe in lock and load
          • confirm snap
        • loose grip
        • let the racket do the work
  • Differential Diagnosis:
  • Prevention
    1. surrender control
    2. do not succumb to your ego's desires
      • to own you and your game
      • to convince you control is possible
      • here lies the dark side!

The bottom line is this. You need to relax and "let go" in the instant immediately before contact with the ball. You have no choice but to "trust the force" that you stored during the Load phase of the stroke. You can't muscle the ball into a desired flight path.

Pushing vs. Pulling

When you hammer a nail, do you push the hammer at the nail or pull it towards the nail? If you answer without thinking about it, I am sure you would pick "push." Actually, you pull the hammer towards the nail. You begin the strike by pulling the butt-end of the hammer forward and down but not actually towards the nail head. Pulling the hammer's head into an orbit that intersects the nail head may seem a poor way to get the head of the hammer to the nail, but it is the only way to do it. If you try to push the hammer's head at the nail not only would you develop very little power, but you will miss the nail most of the time and do a number on your arm.

All tennis strokes work the same way as the hammer and nail. There are no exceptions. A volley may look like an exception, but it is not. The "forward" portion of the volley begins when you pull on the racket handle, down and across the body, along an arc to which the racket handle is tangent. Essentially you are pulling the racket into a tight elliptical orbit around your elbow. Of course, your brain already knows this. It knows how to strike a nail. But your mind, your ego, rejects it. It wants control; over the racket, its face, the ball, the game, life. We are straight line thinkers, and the shortest distance from the backswing to the point of contact has to be a straight line, right? We want the ball to go forward so we must push the racket head forward into and through the ball. We can't possibly get hegemony over the ball by pulling across it! This conflict between the brain and the ego-mind results in tragically bastardized strokes, particularly on the forehand side.

Take, for example, the topspin forehand stroke. In a desperate attempt to "straighten out" the flight path of the racket, we do the best we can to turn a circle into a straight line. The technique is to over-rotate our shoulders through the stroke and present our chest area to our opponent. In essence, we are trying to set the racket free from its orbital prison by lengthening the "tether" that holds it in place while we get behind it and push in the direction of the target. To lengthen the tether we do two things, both of which are foolish; over-rotate our shoulders and push-push-push the racket to "catch up" the head of the racket to the wrist. That "pushing-through" part is inevitable because if we stop pushing the racket head forward it will start to lag again and we will lose the "straight-linedness" that our mind is doggedly determined to achieve. The racket head smashes into the ball with the full force of our bulging muscles pushing the ball up and forward - usually out of play. We also lose racket head speed because as the racket gets further from the body, conservation or angular momentum slows our rotation (it is the opposite effect to a figure skater in a scratch spin.)

Over-rotating the shoulder, a result of straight-line mania, is particularly toxic to effective stroking. Stopping the shoulder rotation is key to stopping the acceleration of the wrist-racket complex and absolutely required if stored forces are to be released and inject directional control and spin into the ball. If you rotate your shoulders through the moment of contact, then control never happens.

Pushing Back Against the Push

In the ongoing battle we wage against the Push Syndrome, the number one weapon we possess has to be awareness. Sometimes awareness is all you need. For example, understanding that when we stop the racket head on the volley we release the stored control forcesthat put us in complete control of the ball. Knowledge alone is not always sufficient, however, to avoid pushing. After all, it isn't trivial to interrupt a topspin forehand in full swing. It requires power. Power to slam on the brakes. Power to stop the shoulders. Changing the shape of the power wave itself requires more than just the intention to do so, it requires action. Since the power to start the shoulders rotating originates in the feet, the power to stop them must also come from the feet. Paradoxically, the soultion lies in my favorite black pearl: "Step into the ball!" For 45 of my 50 years in tennis, I assumed that that phrase meant you should glide into contact with the ball by taking a step forward. How wrong was I?! Dead wrong! That is why stepping in it never, ever helped my game. A tiny edit of that tip turns it into one of the most powerful triggers I have ever discovered: "Step away from the ball!" As you start to swing need to to consolidate all of my body weight on the front foot specifically so you can push back against the stroke before you make contact with the ball. While this seems insane, it is good physics. To complete theh SNAP

Forehand Topspin Power Wave: The feet generate the power wave in the forehand topspin. First, the front foot pushes the weight back to the back foot; powering the reverse-rotation of the backswing proper and loading the back foot. This reverse-rotation creates the initial 'dip' in the power wave. Next, the back foot pushes the weight to the front foot creating the peak of the power wave and driving the load and lag phases. Finally, the front foot pushes back neutralizing the forward acceleration, causing the power wave to plummet and stopping the shoulders so the arm, racket and stored control and spin forces can explode into the ball. This vital last weight transfer is frequently, fatally forgotten by pros and duffers alike.

You know you need to transfer all of your body weight to the back foot during the backswing proper, "loading" your right hip and setting the back foot hard against the court so you can steal momentum from the earth for later delivery to the ball. Similarly, you need to transfer all of that bodyweight to the front foot during the load and lag phases so that at the end of the lag you can forcibly push back against the stroke, slowing the forward rotation of the shoulders and freeing the arm, racket head and stored control and spin forces. If you don't get your front foot set, front knee bent, and front hip ready to push, your shoulders will keep rotating and drive the racket through the ball. No snap, no crackle, and no pop.