I have a friend that can't hit a top spin ball. I worked with her a bit, but we ran out of time to make some real progress. Maybe some theory will help speed up the learning...
I ran across a YouTube video from a pickleball pro teaching top spin. I watch it, as I'm always interested in new ways to teach and maybe there is technical information that I don't know.
And, in this video the gal, Coach Jess, talks about where on the ball you have to deliver the paddle. Ah, the light goes on. Serious readers of the blog will remember that several years ago a blog post talked about this very thing. Jess' instruction did inspire some thought and now let's jump into some practical details.
For all shots except for some lobs and smashes, you have to hit the pickleball below its equator. This is not optional and the reason for this is that the ball must be driven upwards as well as forward. You have to clear the net and the only way to do it is to hit some portion of the bottom of the ball.
Secondly, the paddle face angle must also be pointing to a location above the net. This is again, not optional. So, all hits must contact the ball below its equator and the paddle face angle must be pointing above the net.
Now for spin. The key to spin is recognizing that the variable that controls spin is the swing path of the paddle. Golfers should be familiar with this concept.
Swing path is the direction the paddle is moving when it hits the ball on its required spot.
We have a fixed spot to hit, a fixed paddle face angle, and then swing path. And you can have a fixed wrist position too, there is no need to make wild wrist movements to hit these spins. The spin is produced on contact with the ball. The speed the paddle is moving is important, but for basic, good spin shots, no wrist movement is required.
If the swing path matches the paddle angle then the ball will have no spin on it. You will see this from time to time on court, it's not that rare. The ball will be driven forward, with no energy used to spin the ball. Gravity and wind resistance will control where the ball goes.
To change the spin we need to change the swing path and nothing else. Let's do back spin, aka English, first. In this case the swing path will move from above the contact point to below it. It's a chopping motion. Most people find this easy to do. Again, paddle face angle and contact point are the same.
Backspin shots will fly longer than flat shots and they will bounce differently. Note that they are easier to hit long than flat or top spin shots. Beginners have problems hitting chop shots as the ball must be hit closer to the bottom of the ball as the spin will cause to ball to angle lower than a flat or top spin shot.
Top spin... Now you have to move the swing path from below the contact location to above it. The paddle angle stays the same, the target on the ball remains the same. Top spin shots will initially go higher than other spins, but will hit the ground earlier and they will bounce higher than the other spins. If you want to hit a ball with more velocity, then hitting it with top spin will help keep the ball in bounds. This is the usefulness of the top spin.
Simple, yes? Ok, how about side spin? The swing path is from outside to inside or inside to outside to create the side spin. Note that this can be combined with either backspin or top spin to create spin angles that combine spins.
Side spins will curve in the air to one side or another and then kick as they hit. Pro Tip: the slower you hit a side spin shot, the more it will curve and then kick.
There are ball positions where you can't create a particular spin. Remember that you have to hit the bottom of the ball and if the ball is quite low, you will not be able to create a lot of low to high swing path. In that case, you have to hit more of a flat shot and just get your paddle on the bottom of the ball and hope the face angle is good. There is nothing wrong with a ball with no spin. Side spin will work well with low shots.
Also shots that are quite high lend themselves more to a chop motion and thus favor a backspin shot selection.
So it is the broad middle ground in height that is most suited to hitting a top spin shot. If you observe servers with top spin serves you will see them strike the ball at about waist height. This is the sweet spot. You can still do it when the ball is a bit lower and higher, but recognize that at some point you will need to hit the ball without top spin.
My usual serve and shots are almost all top spin. I like it as it will more likely get the ball over the net and is less likely to go long. I'll hit some chop and side spin as variations, but my main comfort shot is top spin. There are other very nice players who favor the cut spin. It can be quite effective. Pro Tip: hard shots with back spin frequently go long, so be prepared to duck.
That's about it. I'm going to put a pickleball on a stick as a training aid. There are other aids out there. The idea of a ball on a stick is to make the ball spin in the direction you want. Should work, I'll bring it along next week.
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