December 2007 --
Double trouble
The predator stalking your match is not the opponent on the other side of the net - it is the net itself! The net is merciless, forever grabbing the ball and killing the point. Even advanced players have three times as many balls go into the net as they hit out.
But there is a second, and more subtle, problem caused by the net. Only because the net is "transparent" can you see your opponent’s court from your own baseline. This view is insidious because it tempts you to aim directly at the opponent’s court. Unfortunately, this approach produces the second most common "error" in advanced tennis - the short ball. Gravity never sleeps, your opponent moves forward, and you pay! Simply put, when your opponent is back, you have to aim higher - period - and that requires a particular set of trainable skills, both physical and mental.
Overload with "windows"Experience shows that attempting greater depth by aiming directly at ground targets doesn’t work well. A better way to aim is to find a particular window over the net that will allow you to deliver the ball to your objective on the ground. This requires that the ball be hit with a proper combination of direction, arc, spin, and pace. (See the excellent article by Tom Nelson titled "Arc-ology 101" in the January ’05 issue of ADDvantage.) To acquire the mindset for this indirect approach, you need to use drills that make practice more difficult than matches. This technique can be called "overloading." Many sports use the idea in one form or another. Sprinters run sand dunes, baseball players swing weighted bats, and basketball players shoot at undersized rims. Equipment is now available that enables tennis players to overload too.
To overload, in most situations, the net has to be raised. Devices exist that raise the net, hide the net and opponent’s court completely, or impose a ceiling. Players must learn a new, and indirect, targeting technique to achieve the appropriate depth for each situation. To learn to hit a particular ground target, the key is to aim directly at a window in space along the net rather than aiming at the ground target itself; the ball finds the ground target indirectly.
Ground targets remain the ultimate goal for each shot, of course, but the technique for reaching the goal needs to be modified. With the new approach, success is achieved indirectly. Furthermore, realistic ground targets are not what you might think. They should consist of a 6-foot diameter circle and a 6-foot diameter semicircle for ground strokes, a 2-foot diameter circle for serve, and a 6-by-3-foot rectangular target for doubles (see photo below). Of course, when ground targets are needed in live drills, safety concerns dictate the use of flat targets (target dots or dashes) rather than PVC pipe. All of these targets might look huge up close, but they are amazingly hard to hit in a match. The key to hitting them lies in the indirect approach. Both consistency and accuracy are learned faster when you direct each shot through a zone in space, a window, above the net. To advanced players, who learned the game aiming at the court surface, this major mental shift will feel strange at first. New imagery, which will produce greater accuracy, particularly more depth, has to be internalized by repetitive and sequential training over time; it cannot be just "willed" on match day.
The overload progressionWith apologies to BASF, "We don’t make the drills you use; we make the drills you use better!" Pros, coaches and players, don’t abandon your tried-and-true drills that have proved their worth over the years. Just overload and shift the emphasis by adding the indirect approach embodied in the Lifter Target progression which follows. Here is how the five-step progression toward new imagery works:
Step I: For groundstroke depth (passing shots, serves, and service returns follow similar principles), do the drill you have chosen by hitting over a standard net with 6-foot diameter targets (dot circles or dashes) in place on the ground. This will reveal your current skill level and will establish a baseline for comparison purposes later. Having done that, four steps follow, not necessarily on the same day:
Step II: To battle the short ball, create target windows by lifting the net and using properly placed target rod pairs for the same drill you just did. As an example, picture a ground stroke situation from the deep right corner. Photo No. 1 demonstrates the width of the target windows over the net (roughly four feet), which are dictated by the lines of sight crossing the net from the edges of the 6-foot targets. The harder you typically hit, the less the net has to be lifted, but it does have to be lifted - and higher than you think! As an advanced player, you probably aspire to "keep the ball deep." In fact, your coach or pro may already be trying various methods to increase your depth. Unfortunately, a well-struck ball feels good, whether or not it lands deep, and you may be failing to really notice that it has landed short. Why is it, when two players seem equally matched, the same player consistently loses? Often it is because, under pressure, one player tends to land the ball a little short! A worthy opponent moves forward into that short ball and proceeds to dictate play with power or placement. With a lifted net in place, you get instant feedback if your habitual trajectory is too flat; the ball simply doesn’t clear the net!
Step III: Take away the ground targets completely by using an opaque net and target rods in the same positions used in the earlier drill (photo No. 2). The opponent’s side of the court has now become invisible from your baseline. The opaque net leaves no doubt that you are finally aiming at a window in space; there is nothing else left to aim at! Your drilling partner/opponent will give you one-word feedback about where your ball lands. Often when players drill "blind" this way, they report "less distraction" and that "it feels like bowling by the marks." Competitive points or games played over an opaque net quickly highlight your need for depth control and a higher margin of safety.
Step IV: Use a lifted headband (some prefer a lifted cable for volley-to-volley drills) with target rod pairs still in the same positions, that puts the window for a deep ball above the lifted headband but the window for a short, wide passing shot is below or barely above it (photo No. 3). The deep groundstroke and the short, wide crosscourt require different trajectories, and therefore different spins and pace, but these shots can be practiced in the same drill using a lifted headband. The opponent’s court is again fully visible, and the over-and-under configuration offers a unique, and useful, perspective. Remember, in doubles, when groundstrokes are sent short and wide, and in volleying rallies at the net, the target window shifts from left to right as opponents shift, and is below the lifted headband between the opponents most of the time. The ability to hit the low, middle window is an essential skill because it automatically delivers the ball to the opponents’ feet. This, in turn, elicits a high ball or even a sitter. In doubles, it is trite but true, "Hit feet to defeat; hit high and die." Effective low-ball drills require a ceiling!
Step V: Complete the progression by returning to the conventional net at conventional height with no target rods. Do the drill again, but with new insight. The net will feel low and the drill will feel easy. Although hard to quantify, your skill level will have risen even in a single practice session, and almost certainly you will have new insight into trajectories and targets.
In competition, an almost malicious net looms as a double menace. It either grabs the ball outright, or it offers an expansive view of the opponent’s court, which can lull you into hitting short. Both threats can be countered using this progression. Proper training can change shot elevation and raise your game. However, you have to overload, which means you must make targeting in practice more demanding than in a match. Although this usually requires you to lift the net, occasionally you must impose a ceiling. With a lifted net and revised imagery, an entirely new mind-set is the goal, where the primary target is a window in space - high and close - the ground target is secondary, and depth control is born of the indirect approach.
For more information on the Lifter Target system, call Advantage/Thomco at 800-328-0075 or e-mail ask_adv@libby.org. 
