Tip of the Week
Learn from Students of the Game, Crafty Veterans, and Hedgehogs.
Weekend Coaching, Dr. Seuss, Ongoing Injuries, and the Baltimore Science Fiction Convention
I coached in three junior group sessions. The focus this weekend might have been random play. I did a lot of random drills and just random rallying with players. The keys here are 1) ready position; 2) don’t anticipate, just react; and 3) return to ready position.
Besides the normal keys to a good ready position, a key thing I emphasize is that their ready position changes based on where I’m hitting the ball. If they go to my wide forehand, then I have more angle into their wide forehand (assuming we’re both righties), and less into their backhand, and so they have to move toward their forehand side. They also should roughly point their racket at where I’m hitting the ball from, so they can move equally well to their forehand or backhand side, depending on where I hit the ball.