Practicing your serve on your knees

I heard Djokovic's coach had him do it to improve His serve.

Anyone tried it?

:spit: i thought....oh nvrmind....and yeah my coach had me do that once, hurt like hell:sobbing:

Did it help your serve?

I'm a coach and have had my students do it. Have also tried it myself.

Definitely helps get your ball-toss to be more accurate. Also gets you into the idea of serving 'up', because most people are only 3 feet tall when on their knees and the net seems awful high! :)

I guess it might work, but isn't a huge part of the serve the use of your legs? I think it might screw up your toss though since you can't use your legs. It depends on the mechanics of your serve though.

There is a benefit of serving from the knees to learn the ball-strike spins and other stuff, but if you know how to put kick on the serve then you should try to synchronize your knee band with your racket speed ( movement of the racket is initiated with your legs).

I`ve tried it and personally, I didn`t notice any true improvement in my play. There are many more efficient exercises to improve the accuracy of your service. Which one do you find the most effective?

It's fun for me, and sometimes I serve better on my knees than standing up :tape: ..although it does hurt when you pull your racket down all the way and it hits your ankle

The worst is doing this exercice on a synthetic surface, It burns so much!

I have no idea why Todd Martin (Novak's previous coach) would have a professional player try this out. This is coaching tool used to get people accustomed to putting topspin on the serve. However, one can cheat and hit up with a flat stroke and get it over the net.

IMO the best way to teach topspin on the serve, is to show what kind of spin the ball is supposed to have. If I know that for a topspin serve, the ball is supposed to spin on a horizontal axis then obviously I have to strike the ball vertically from bottom to top.

I tried this but it only worked with an abbreviated motion on my swinging arm and a low ball toss. I also had to hold the handle of the racket way up close to the throat because otherwise I would just end up smacking the racket on the ground after hitting the ball.

I found that it was easy to hit topspin, like it's supposed to help illustrate, but it doesn't translate to my normal serve when standing up because of all the adjustments I mentioned due to being on my knees.

I don't think this excercise was effective in improving my serve.

Caralenko said I should use a bed instead.

So what other exercises do you guys use to improve your serve?

So what other exercises do you guys use to improve your serve?

A lot of shadow serving, especially if I hit a double fault. I like to make sure I get the tomahawk throwing action right.

My serve warm up was

On knees, sitting on chair, standing still, one on foot, taking one step in as a follow through, build up to full motion.

This was training on my serves (EVERY SERVE) for about an hour a day when I thought I could become pro :sobbing:

I tried this but it only worked with an abbreviated motion on my swinging arm and a low ball toss. I also had to hold the handle of the racket way up close to the throat because otherwise I would just end up smacking the racket on the ground after hitting the ball.

I found that it was easy to hit topspin, like it's supposed to help illustrate, but it doesn't translate to my normal serve when standing up because of all the adjustments I mentioned due to being on my knees.

I don't think this excercise was effective in improving my serve.

Well that's exactly the reason for serving from the knees. Most recreational players have a forehand grip, therefore no use of wrist on the serve, and the forehand grip also makes them hit downwards. When serving from the knees you have to learn hitting up and using the wrist. When you do that there is no danger of hitting the ground with your racket.

Learning how to put spin on the serve has not much to do with serving from the knees. If you have trouble getting spin on the serve, then try to serve while lying on your back. No chance to serve WITHOUT spin from that position.