Yeah.

They weren't even thinking about where they wanted the return to go.

That's typically what you'll hear.

"I was just trying to get my racket on the ball," or, "I was- I'm just hoping it goes over the net." The more intentional we can be with our targets, the better off we're gonna be.

So let's take a first serve.

If you're returning a first serve, which against a given opponent, I'm assuming is maybe a little bit faster, it's a little bit deeper, you have a little, maybe a little bit less time.

In singles it's a great idea to return serve deep down the middle.

Oh.

Right.

That's every action has an equal and opposite.

So one of the biggest problems I am constantly fixing for players through video analysis is when they're at the net, whether they're the server's partner and they get the return of serve coming right at them, or they're coming to net in singles on a serve and volley, it isn't, "Hey, did I step with the correct foot?" It was you have to make sure that you organize your feet so that after you hit the ball, you then step with the appropriate foot.

That gets your right arm and left leg, just like Usain Bolt, going forward together.

And this is, the way I have people practice this is I ask them to think of hitting open stance volleys.

When you think of hitting an open stance volley and then stepping afterward, it fixes it right then and there.

Now you get your momentum moving while you're hitting the volley, then you don't need to take a swing.

Mm-hmm