The Tennis Serve-Proper Grip

Frankie Dell: Hi! I am Frankie Dell, I am a professional Tennis Instructor. You are watching 'How to Serve'. So let me just start off and show you how to hit a proper serve. So let me just start off by showing you what a proper serve should look like. Notice I am set up at an angle. I have the proper grip, I am not holding too tightly my hand is loose, my arm is loose. I am turning my shoulders and my upper body. Adequate toss, not too high not too low. I am getting my arm in the back stretching motion and I am following through across my body and I am stepping into the court after I make contact. That's the proper serve okay. The first thing we need to talk about is how to grip the racket for a serve. For serve we are going use what we call a Continental Grip and that is best achieved, this is the easiest way. You just hold your racket up here on this side, put your thumb and forefinger at the top and just slide it down and that's it. Some people call it a Chopper Grip because a sort of same way you have might hold an axe. Also if you look at your hand how the thumb and the finger here form a V. After you run it down, you will notice the V is right on the left edge of the racket. So if you are not sure if you have the Continental Grip, slide it down and notice where the V is. The V is on the left side and that's the Continental Grip.

Now the reason we hold it this way is because this let's your wrist remains flexible and you are to need to flexibility in your wrist, the better you get, so you are able to put spins on the serve. There have been some occasions where I have allowed players to slightly move the V over to the right. It's just a little more comfortable if you are starting out, but I only let this, only let them keep the grip there for maybe one or two lessons and then I quickly move it over to the left in the Continental Grip. That's how you grip the racket.

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