elbow when you strike the shuttle is low. lower body rotation is a bit limited. You can twist your hips more and stop your right leg from swinging outwards. make it swing fowards a bit more. you dont look like a pro because of the years of accumulated training that they do.
@mtu620 IMO you would benefit, if you keep your heels slightly up. I often observed, that you stand with full sole on court. Will improve your movement, will make you make springy and faster. Try to turn your hip more and start turning hip before moving shoulder and arm into the shuttle.
Your bodyweight is also backwards most of the time - see the torso leaning backwards during any of the smashes as a reference. You should be leaning forwards, thus getting more bodyweight into the shot - you need to be further behind the shuttle to be able to lean forwards and have the bodyweight going forwards. Your contact is a little low (as Cheung pointed out). Given your current standard, I would encourage you to make the whole action much faster and potentially a little more compact on follow through. Good luck!
@mtu620 Hehehe.... Your disappointment at losing that last point made me chuckle. I think cheung, MSeeley and ucantseeme covered most things. Anyways let me clear one thing at the start that I'm not a coach. But I can point out some things which I don't feel right and then others can tell if it needs work. According to me you are still rising up when you smash the shuttle. When I jump smash then I contact the shuttle when I'm at the highest point in my jump ( when I'm neither going up anymore and simply suspended in mid-air momentarily ) OR when I'm on my way down. But you take the shot a moment before you reach maximum elevation and I think this is affecting your power delivery + depth + steepness. Another thing which I observed/felt is at the point of contact you don't allow the racquet head to really impart full forward force to the shuttle, you kind of pull it away a moment too soon towards left. Cheers. Disclaimer:- I'm simply comparing your jump smash to My Own (which can be far from ideal itself).
I also suggest on the jumping not to jump straight like "|" just high in the Z axes. It's a slightly jumping into the shuttle "/" like pushing off with a bit of movement in the Y axes. This will also add power and help to recover better or follow for the the kill. @mtu620 IMO you are a tall guy (6 foot 3?), you should have naturally a good angle. Don't do this jumping thing too exaggerated. Fix the movement, hip rotation, contact point, scissor-kick first and you will get sharper angles without jumping. Then you can try to learn to fly.
Actually, last summer, I was putting some intense practice sessions with a great coach and trying to address some inconsistency issues of hitting into the net. He told me to go up to the shuttle and not to hit on the way down. My drops and smashes immediately got better and more consistent going just over the net rather than just below the tape.
Thanks cheung. So are you saying that I should try hitting the shuttle on my way up like the OP is doing ? Or avoid the contact on my way down ? Because I smash right at the moment I feel I'm about to start descending. I do have some issues with hitting right at the tape but I simply pass it off as a bad day and start smashing more deep (further towards the back court). Cheers.
this is what I also used to do. I had never heard of hitting as you go up but hey, the coach is the expert and I am paying him to teach me. So, I tried it and after a little adjustment, it worked really well. I was rather shocked at the difference.
Ohhhh - Noooooo. Why did I have to reply to mtu620 This new revelation is gonna mess with my head now. What other difference did you acknowledge with the adjustment ? Cheers.
Today I had a few smashes hitting the tape. I immediately tried taking the shot bit early. Does it apply to all the hits - while jumping sideways or backing up or scissor jump ?
Would like to expand this since this was the first thing I noticed as well. It looks like you move back and even pause slightly before jumping (backwards, or upwards whilst leaning backwards). The reason you jump backwards is because you weren’t far back enough to begin with, even though you had the time to pause previously. It may look like the pros are pausing before they jump up, but they are not - as soon as they make that movement backwards, they are initiating their jump (upwards+forwards where possible). Initiating a jump includes moving your body weight low, onto your rear foot before powerfully jumping forwards, which just looks like pausing because not much is actually moving. The whole sequence will require more energy and more effort on your part, but what you’ll see is more powerful smashes, more options, and better recovery for the next stroke. Good luck!
I have taken all your advice and have made some improvement. The biggest contributor to my improvement is focusing on the scissor jump: lifting non dominant leg, pushing off dominant leg, rotating hips, striking shuttle. I feel consistently more power/accuracy/consistency in the smash somehow; it's oddly satisfying. However there are still unresolved issues. I've noticed the end of my clear/smash/any overhead stroke ends like in the left panel of the picture, whereas for everyone else it ends like in the right panel. This could be due a host of issues, and my concerns are addressed below. I don't understand how others: 1. in preparation for the smash, can take their racket back all the way back close to their buttocks before the swing. This is extremely difficult for me in a game situation. There is barely any backward swing for me as I often feel there is not enough time. 2. (see attached picture) swing such that the end of the stroke looks like right side of the attached picture. I can never get my upper extremity (left) to look like that. 3. can smash so deeply. If anything, my smashes are steep but they are NEVER deep, probably due to the above issues. I think I: 1. for power, use too much arm. There is incomplete pronation/supination. I still feel I'm swiping the shuttle, as my stroke motion is in the shape of a oblique circle/oval. 2. for power, don't use enough lower extremity strength. I've watched videos but don't really understand the concept of transferring power from the ground to calves to gluts etc... 3. am slicing, hitting the bird at a slight angle rather than perpendicularly. 4. am not reaching high up enough for the shuttle. Any help is again greatly appreciated!
Give us a new video and we can help better. To answer your questions: 1. people don't take their racket back close to their buttocks. It's an illusion and if you spent more time studying different players, you would see everyone does it a different amount. Some players have the racket drop downwards a lot, others just have the racket go backwards a lot (without going downwards much). The longer the swing, the more backwards or downwards the racket will go. A compact swing won't do this as much (but more than enough). However, if you relax more as you forward swing, your racket will naturally be further backwards and/or downwards - but don't TRY to do it. It's a mistake to even think about it. 2. Your second top left photo is nearly the same as the ones on the right - all you need to do is extend your arm further in front (straighten it) and rotate the forearm more so that the racket shaft points downwards. You are not far off. It will change as you strike the shuttle more powerfully with correct form. 3. What do you mean deep? So l;ets compare that to what you think: 1. Yep, incomplete pronation. You can fix this by relaxing slightly more prior to contact, and squeezing more at contact trying to swing the racket FORWARDS, THROUGH the shuttle. Once you've hit the shuttle, you would then relax again immediately, and the pronation will continue and you'll be fine. 2. Without a video, we can't diagnose this for you. Its really simple though: crouch down with knees bent, explode upwards into the air, and as you are rising, swing your racket (or try to throw a ball). THAT is how to transfer power! So simply: bend the legs and lean slightly away from target (that stores the energy), then try to feel like you are "pulling" power from your back leg as you straighten it, and then you shift from leaning backwards to leaning more forwards, and you swing the racket. Power transfer happens when a joint goes from bent to straight (e.g. bent knee to straight knee, will transfer power upwards). For now don't try to understand it too much - focus on the racket a bit more. 3. Probably. Try the exercise I mentioned about swing forwards through the shuttle, with the correct grip. It should help. 4. Probably. Its true for most people and explains why your arm is bent in your photos. Good luck!
Here is a new video. I know my problems, just don't know how to fix them, or I can fix them in practice but not in a match. These are just my analysis, probably plenty of problems more! Feel free to comment; please be specific on how to correct the problems. I lose a lot of points due 1. to inability to do around the head footwork during a match effectively, causing the weak backhand (1:46-1:50) (9:12-9:15) (9:22-9:26) (17:25) 2. when the opponent hits deep and fast to forehand, causing me to scramble from base position to retrieval, creating easy kill. (6:16-6:20) feel i am out of position (7:50-7:55) 3. feeling as if I'm off balance/hitting while moving backward, contacting the shuttle late. My feet are really far off the ground as a result (probably to compensate), which i'm sure makes recovery very slow. (15:50) (16:49-16-55) (18:38) 4. overall don't know singles strategy. If I win, it is because I am a brick wall, because the opponents have made errors, am overall faster than opponent. How do I create opportunities? Much appreciated.
1, 2, 3 are all movement related issues, and a big thing that is reasonably obvious is your upright stance. Bend your knees more, get lower and in order: 1) round the heads are easier because you can push off and pivot round instead of falling backwards 2) you get a bigger push off so you can cut off fast/deep shots before they go too far 3) you’ll make further movement backwards before you move forwards so you won’t be jumping backwards as much. For 4, you’ll need to be more specific about what you’re trying to accomplish when you return a shot. I would disagree that you play like a brick wall. Quite clearly when given a high shot even near the back lines, you are choosing to smash more than you are clearing/dropping I.e you are forcing a weak reply, rather than waiting for your opponent to make an error. First be honest about what you’re trying to do, then we can work on how you might want to change it.
@DarkHiatus already point out the big items for movement. You are doing not bad, just need to keep your legs stable. Stable footwork means more efficient power transfer to your shot (simple analogy is that you can't fire a cannon far if your base is unstable) In terms of bend your knee more, what works for me is squat a little bit to keep the body centre gravity lower and lean toward the front. Your rear forehand corner will need more practice. Again this will improve as your foot stability improve and a lot of recreational/club level player will struggle to play this shot well. One of the things I like about singles is doing high deep long serve (like women singles). Strategically it has worked to my advantage to keep my opponent at the rear court and lure them to error (not deep enough clear to give you opportunity to smash, drop shot to the net = instant point for you, etc...). Again,you need to acknowledge you only need to create a difficult shot for your opponent to return. You can't be always going for the instant smash kill.
Did a two days training in August with a coach whom is a former french national player (Sébastien Plançon) and he did say the same thing to me.
