• Home
• Forums
• About Us
• Blog
• Contact
• Links

Tennis Lessons / 1H Backhand / Step 6

Follow Through

How To :

1. Arm and racket extend out as a unit in the direction you are hitting.

2. The arm rotates at the shoulder.

3. Hitting arm position does not start to break down until WELL into the follow through.

4. Non-hitting arm extends back.

Figure 1: Oliver following through

From contact, Oliver extends in the direction he is hitting. His hitting arm position – both his arm and his racket – does not change until well into his follow through. His hand is about eye level when he first starts to relax. There is, however, rotation at the shoulder as he follows through. That is why his hitting arm position may look different. To be clear, the racket is pointed up late in the follow through, as opposed to horizontal at contact, because the shoulder rotates, not because Oliver’s hitting arm position is breaking down.

You can see that Oliver also extends his non-hitting arm back as he follows through. You may also have noticed that pros vary the amount that they extend that arm back when they hit. The non-hitting arm controls how much your body rotates during the follow through. The farther you extend your arm back, the less you will rotate, and vica versa. I’m not going to get into the pros and cons of more, or less, body rotation during the follow through. I will suggest, however, that if you are just starting out you extend that arm back and try to limit the amount your body rotates. You can add more rotation once you improve.

Common Errors:

Letting you hitting arm position break down too soon.

Doing so makes it less likely you will make solid contact (even though you have already hit the ball).

Pulling the racket across your body as opposed to extending out.

This will also negatively impact your contact. Chances are, if you are pulling the racket across your body when you follow through, the racket is moving in the wrong direction before contact.

Back to Step 5 «