Bigger Better Tennis - Paul Dale

The serve is a unique shot in tennis because its the only " closed skill " shot we hit, meaning we control all the elements from start to finish. All other shots are " open skilled " which means we must react and adapt to what our opponent sends our way. I believe a big part of serving well is the attitude you bring to serving. If you feel the serve is merely a way to start points then your serve will never be a true weapon. I believe that the serve is your premier weapon and the best opportunity to win points quickly and consistently. You should maintain an aggressive and confident mindset regarding the serve. Having a more positive, aggressive mindset over time also creates "instinct" that helps you maintain control of your service games, maintain momentum with your service games and the ability to get yourself out of those tricky break point situations that come along sometimes.  In order to create instinctive service shot selection when a

PROFESSIONAL TENNIS IS PLAYED AROUND THE WORLD AT MANY LEVELS There are thousands of players, both men and women, who are trying to make their way in the world of professional tennis. I thought it would be interesting to clarify the steps, in my opinion,  that a player must take to get all the way to the top.  No National Ranking & No ATP points Can’t always get into the qualifying draw for local futures and must rely on wild cards National Ranking but no ATP Points Possible to enter qualifying of Futures events because of his National ranking but not always accepted Enough ATP points to enter Futures qualifying Must compete in the qualifying events where physical & mental fatigue can be a major obstacle in progressing deeper in the tournament Qualifies into the main draw consistently But has trouble progressing much further because of the physical and mental demands of qualifying Enough Points to enter Main D

Many years ago I was watching a match in Japan between Andres Gomez and Aaron Krickstein. I was sitting close to the court and realized that I was watching something very different from anything I had ever seen before.   I was watching a table tennis rally!   Both Gomez and Krickstein were trying to produce a rally that was dominated by the flight of the ball rather than where the ball was bouncing . They were controlling the ball inside a tight “funnel” of arc through the use of topspin. Today that might seem normal but back then it was the beginning of a new era in tennis. Long before this, Bjorn Borg had changed our perception of topspin in tennis.   Borg hit the ball with much more arc than any other player at that time and years later while watching   that match in Japan I was witnessing the beginning of a post Borg era. The younger players coming through such as Krickstein and Jimmy Arias were hitting tremendous topspin on the ball and in the process were increasi