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Tennis Lessons / Serve / Step 2

Toss and Backswing

The toss and the backswing deal with your upper body's preparation during your service motion. To hit the ball properly, you need to put the ball in the right place. The backswing puts your arm in a position to swing forward correctly.

How To :

1. Arms separate.

The following steps focus on the toss:

2. Tossing arm drops down and then comes straight up.

3. Release the ball at about the top of your head.

4. Tossing arm continues to rise until it is extended straight up over your head.

The following steps focus on the backswing:

5. Hitting arm drops down and then begins to rise. As it begins to rise, the palm stays facing the tennis court.

6. Arm continues to rise until it reaches the "L" position, where upper arm is on the same plane as the shoulders, the elbow is bent 90 degrees and the racket is pointed up at the sky.

Figure 1: Down together up together

To begin my motion, my arms separate and drop down together. Let's first focus on my toss. I keep my tossing arm relatively straight as I begin to raise it. I release the ball at about the top of my head by "opening up" my hand. This is the simplest way to get no spin on the ball, which is what I'm looking for because it makes the toss easiest to control. After I toss the ball, I continue to raise my tossing arm in a smooth motion until it is extended straight up into the air.

Now let's look at my hitting arm. After it drops down, I begin to raise it but I keep my palm facing the court. I keep raising my racket until I get to the "L" position.

I'm looking to time it so that my tossing arm and hitting arm complete their respective motions at the same time — where my tossing arm is pointed straight up and my hitting arm and racket form an "L."

Coaches often call this motion "down together up together" because both arms start and stop at the same time. You've probably noticed that some pros don't use this motion —Andy Roddick for example. That's fine. Of all the various fundamentally sound ways to serve, we think this one is the easiest to learn. By the way, Roger Federer uses it.

Common Errors:

Rolling the ball off your fingers when you toss.

This mistake results in an inconsistent toss. I emphasized above that you want no spin on the tennis ball as it leaves your hand / fingers. If you don't have any spin on the ball, that means you aren't rolling it off your fingers. It is simply not possible to be precise when the ball is rolling off your fingers.

Forgetting to keep your palm down when you raise the racket.

Keep the palm down really helps you get to the correct "L" position. If you raise the racket with your palm up, for example, it makes more difficult to get there.

Incorrect "L" position.

This makes it very difficult for you to swing forward properly later in the serve.

Read Serve Step 3 »

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