Couple of Serve questions
 

When I flat serve and it goes in, it's pretty much always on the line or very close to it.

I read something somewhere that if you're not able to serve in the middle of the box then there's something wrong with your technique? (you shouldn't be hitting down, or something like that)

Also for top spin serves do you make contact with your body still at 90 degrees to the court and do you pronate after you make contact with ball, before or during contact?

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

How I always feel with trying to help someone with their strokes is by telling them to do something that feels comfortable to them. If you notice, pros do not hit the same. You see Soderling hitting these windmill forehands and tossing the ball so high up and then you see someone like Federer who has textbook-like strokes and then you see Nadal who has very extreme grips.

With that being said, I don't think technique really has much to do with your issue. I mean some things you can try to change are how high your ball toss is or your contact point is because if you think about it, gravity and how "down" you hit the ball will both affect how soon the ball is going to hit the court. So you really have a few variables you can control, the height of contact (ball toss), the angle on which you hit the ball, how hard you hit the ball, and how much spin you use.

It can also be the case that you just aren't tall enough sadly. Since the net is the lowest point in the middle, it allows for most players to hit flat serves down the T. And then of course the wider you want to hit the ball, the higher the net is. While it isn't a considerable amount of change, it is enough to not allow many players to hit flat out wide. You see players like Karlovic/Isner who have absolutely no trouble hitting completely flat serves to any part of the box. While at the same time, someone like Nadal who has a pretty low ball toss IIRC and is much shorter, will almost always only hit flat ones down the T and will spin everything wide.

You could also just be serving well and only require more practice until you can just finally start picking your spots. If you post up a video, it would be much easier to help. As for help with a topspin serve, like I said, technique is very hard and uncomfortable to teach. As long as you know the basic rule of brushing up against the back of the ball you will do fine. The process of pronation should be the entire time, it isn't a matter of before/during/after, it is a whole process. Again, a video would help greatly.

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

thanks. your advice is very informative.

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

Hi RocketServer - kinda funny name for someone working on a decent serve. As to the specific question, I agree with the previous answer. You know, once you start analyzing it this way, talking about pronation before or after contact and the exact degrees of the torso, we are in the wrong territory. I think walking down this path is overthinking it. You need to get out and serve buckets of balls (preferably with a coach/ teaching pro) who can adjust as you go. I highly recommend it.
Hope this helps.

:)

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

I don't really hit the topspin serve because it's so uncomfortable. Instead I use what I call a 3/4 kicker where i don't use the full topspin on my serve but rather take a little spin off and add a little more power.

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

Knowing how to mix up slice/kick/twist is great in matches. It is pretty funny when the entire time you hit kick serves to your opponents backhand, and once you feel they are starting to read it, you throw in a twist serve.

Re: Couple of Serve questions
 

Fortunate to read the thread. It is full of constructive advice. Thanks for posting.