Reality: If the player attempts to serve like that, the serve will lack power because gravity will pull on the upper body, which is leaning backwards.

In reality, the player transfers weight one more time from the back foot to the front foot (or both equally) before driving up into the ball.

The weight transfer is therefore from the front foot to the back foot, and immediately to the front foot again. Then, the service motion toward the ball begins.

Illusion #2 – The Follow Through Is Not to the Left (for Right-Handers)

Illusion: As the player finishes the serve, in most cases, it seems that the racket ends up on the left side of the player’s body.

We may misinterpret this as the player having to swing from the contact point toward the left side of the body.

Reality: If the player swings from the contact point to the left, it won’t be possible to hit the ball cleanly with good power. The player will also move the arm toward the body, which will be uncomfortable.

In reality, we don’t initially swing to the left. Instead, we swing forward (and even somewhat to the right) because we are giving the ball direction with the racket and because pronation and internal shoulder rotation are occurring.

After we complete the forward swing, the body starts to uncoil and rotate, and the right shoulder comes forward. This motion then moves the right arm and the racket to the left.

At this point, the right arm also relaxes and swings freely to the left.

Thus, the entire move to the left is largely created by body rotation and the final relaxation of the right arm, not by forcefully swinging to the left.

Illusion #3 – The Elbow Is Not Low

Illusion: When we observe a player in the trophy position just before swinging upward, we can see that the elbow of the hitting arm is relatively low to the body.

We may misinterpret this as a dropping of the elbow to get into the trophy position.

Reality: If the player intentionally drops the hitting arm’s elbow, it will not be possible to execute a serve with a good throwing motion therefore the serve will be weak.

The illusion of a low elbow is due to the player tilting his or her body backwards in the trophy position.

If the player straightens up while keeping both arms in the same position, we can then see that the elbow is just below shoulder height.

The reason the elbow appears to lower is simply a body tilt and not the actual movement of the elbow.

Illusion #4 – The Racket Is Not Vertical in the Trophy Position

Illusion: If we look at the racket orientation when the player is in the trophy position, we often think the racket is vertical.

We may misinterpret the player as trying to hold the racket vertically with the hand in relation to the forearm.

Reality: If the player is holding the racket vertically with the hand and then tilt the body back, as one normally does when loading for a serve, the racket face will also tilt backward and open up.

We call that the “waiter’s serve” position, and it’s one of the most common mistakes in tennis serve techniques. It is also difficult to correct.

If the player positions himself in the trophy position so that the body tilts backwards with the racket vertical and then straightens up, we will see that the racket is now diagonal in the hand (closed).

So, the hand does not hold the racket vertically in relation to the forearm but at an angle.

It is only because we tilt the body backward that the racket moves from an initial closed orientation to a vertical position.

Illusion #5 – We Don’t Face the Court at Contact

Illusion: If we observe a player completing a serve from a front or side view, we will see that the body is turned with the shoulders at more than 90 degrees. Thus, the player does not appear to be facing forward but turned slightly to the side.

Since the whole serve movement happens quickly, it seems as if the player is facing forward when making contact with the ball.

Reality: If the player faces forward at contact, it won’t be possible to deliver maximum power to the ball because the player’s shoulders are in an uncomfortable position.

In reality, we face the ball, which means the body is angled at around 45 degrees to the side at contact.

The body actually decelerates and stops at that position for a split second to transfer momentum to the arm, whose motion then accelerates.

After the arm motion starts decelerating after contact, the body begins to move forward again.

All this motion happens in a split second, making it difficult to see. In fact, it is a natural sequence of movements that we develop subconsciously from throwing objects, such as stones, sticks, or balls, in childhood.

Illusion #6 – We’re Not Arching the Back

Illusion: When we observe the player in the trophy position, it seems that the body is tilted backward. We can misinterpret that position as the player arching the back to “lean” backwards.

Reality: If the player arches the back, it will result in weakness in the lower back because gravity will pull the upper body down as it leans backwards.

Now, the player cannot push strongly upward into the serve because of having to fight against his or her weight. Therefore, the serve will be weak.

In reality, we don’t achieve a tilted body position by arching the back but by pushing the knees forward and bending them.

We still maintain a perfectly straight and firm lower back while we push our knees forward, and that provides strength as we begin upward movement toward the ball.

Conclusion

This article on visual illusions in tennis serves as the last of the tennis illusions series that began some time ago with the videos of the pros in which the rackets were digitally removed.

That helped us see the actual arm movements in space without being distracted by the racket’s movement.

We also recently covered the forehand and backhand backswing illusions and other common stroke illusions that cause us to misinterpret what we see.

Most people learn tennis visually. Accordingly, it is crucial to have the correct mental image of a tennis stroke.

Feel free to revisit this series to discover new nuances of tennis strokes.

Illusion #1 – Contact Point Is Not To The Side

Illusion: Because the racket extends approximately 0.5 meters (1.6 feet) from the hand, it seems like we are hitting the ball well on the side of the body and need to EXTEND to the side with our arm to execute the stroke properly.

Reality: When we remove the racket from the hand and observe the arm movement without it, we realize that the arm does not extend to the side much. The arm is actually positioned more forward than to the side at the point of contact.

Illusion #2 – The Swing Path Is Not Horizontal

Illusion: This relates to the previous illusion. If player believes they need to reach to the side to hit the ball, then they will also visualize a very horizontal racket path that goes around the body.

Reality: When we remove the racket and simulate the arm swing of a forehand (or backhand), we can see that the swing path is much more up and down rather than left and right.

In other words, it more closely resembles a bowling motion than a discus throw (in athletics).

Note: The only situation where the arm does swing more horizontally is when hitting high balls around shoulder height.

Illusion #3 – Preparation Is Not (Very) High

Illusion: When we initially prepare the racket for the forehand or backhand, we start with a lift. The tip of the racket head will end up above our head.

If the player misinterprets that movement – since they see the racket head higher than the head – they will attempt to lift their arm and hand very high, which creates a loop that is too big.

Reality: When we remove the racket from the hand and only observe how high the hand lifted from the initial ready position to the prepared position, we realize that it’s not high at all. It’s actually around shoulder high for forehands and slightly lower for one- and two-handed backhands.

Illusion #4 – There Is No Wrist Slap

Illusion: If we look at the forehand or backhand when it’s just a split moment before contact, we can see that the racket face is still facing 90 degrees away from the ball and our desired direction of stroke.

When players look at that image while knowing they need to hit the ball a split second later, they believe they need to use the wrist to move the racket 90 degrees forward and align it with the ball.

In other words, they want to slap forward with the wrist into the ball. If they do that, they will play very inconsistently because the racket angle will change very rapidly as it passes through the contact point, resulting in the balls spraying out of contact very randomly.

Reality: We don’t need to use the wrist to move the racket forward 90 degrees. That will happen automatically if we just continue our whole arm move forward.

On the forehand and two-handed backhand stroke, the body rotation will help add that extra rotation to the racket face in order to align it with the ball. On the one-handed backhand, the arm and forearm movement forward will align the racket with the ball.

Note: The pros release the wrist more and actually slap the ball on the forehand quite a lot in some situations (but not the one-handed backhand!).

However, I don’t recommend that technique to recreational tennis players because it’s too difficult to play consistently like that without years of training.

Illusion #5 – Racket Face Is Not Open (Much) At Backhand Slice Contact

Illusion: When we prepare for the backhand slice, we can clearly see quite an open racket face. When we finish the backhand slice stroke, we see the racket face even more open; in fact, it’s pointing directly upward.

This creates the illusion that the racket face was opening more and more as we were executing the stroke. When players believe that and want to hit a backhand slice like that, all their balls will float upward with lots of backspin and no power.

Reality: The racket face actually starts to close from the initial preparation. At contact, it is just slightly open, in some cases almost perpendicular to the ball.

That allows us to apply some backspin to the ball and hit more through in order to give the ball more power. After that almost perpendicular racket position at contact, the racket starts to open again.

This is one of the most common visual illusions/misinterpretations in tennis because the changes in racket angle are so quick that you cannot see them with the naked eye at the actual speed of hitting. You can see that only in slow motion or in freeze frame right at contact.

Illusion #6 – Volley Not To The Side & Forward

Illusion: When observing a player hitting a forehand or a backhand volley from the front view, it will appear as though the arm goes forward and away from the body.

If players visualize the stroke like that, they will tend to have very unstable and inconsistent volleys because the arm will not be properly supported and stabilized by the body.

Reality: The illusion is created because the observer fails to see that the body turned around 45 degrees to the side as the player prepared for the volley.

The correct execution of the forehand and backhand volley is when the body stays in that orientation throughout the movement of the arm that is executing the volley.

If we then look at the volley execution from a side view that’s at around 45 degrees to the player, we can see that the arm does not move forward and away from the body but actually across the body diagonally.

That gives us much more stability at contact and therefore much more consistent and accurate volleys. This applies to both the forehand and the backhand volley.

Stay tuned for six more serve visual illusions in the upcoming video article.

While I am preparing for the backhand, the racket travels in space quite a lot from the initial ready position to the preparation position.

Because we hold the racket in the arm and the racket moves 4-5 feet in space, it first appears we move the racket backwards with the arm.

So, the lower body is facing forward, the upper body has turned 90 degrees, and the head is still facing forward.

That makes it tricky for the mind to determine what is actually “behind” when we try to copy a backhand backswing after observing a player we’re visually learning from.

If we don’t carefully observe all the body segments and the relation of the racket to each of them, then it appears the racket goes “behind” the player.

If you perceive that the racket goes behind, then you will attempt to move your arm as far back as you can in order to match the movement of your body to what you see.

That’s a mistake. If you move your arm backwards and add body rotation, you will end up with a backswing that’s too big. That will cause you to hit late and have trouble with difficult balls.

Revealing The Arm Movement

If I now isolate the arm movement without adding the body rotation, you will realize that it’s just a short lift from the ready position.

We could also call it a short pull since the non-dominant arm is pulling the racket up. It is stretching mostly the shoulder muscles of the dominant arm, which are now ready to be released.

Let’s look at a real-life example so that you see that the short arm movement also happens in real play.

What we’re interested in seeing is how much the arm moves in relation to the body.

We can take two images, one in the ready position and one in the backswing phase, and look at the arm movement in relation to the body.

We can crop away the head and the lower body so that they don’t distract our eyes, and we are now looking at the body in both cases facing the viewer with the arm movement clearly visible.

If I overlay the images so that the body aligns well, we can clearly see how little the arm moved from the ready position to the so-called backswing.

It’s just a short lift helped by the non-dominant arm.

The hitting arm will, of course, swing further back when the body starts uncoiling, but that’s not something we really “do.” It’s just something that happens.

That’s exactly why I am sharing these illusion videos. Recreational tennis players want to imitate the pros that they observe on TV or online, so they attempt to “do” everything that they see.

They do not realize or understand which parts of the whole movement we “do” and which parts just happen because of relaxation, momentum, or some other cause.

When we prepare for the one-handed backhand, the only thing we do with the arm is a short lift.

Then we start LETTING the arm drop as we are uncoiling the body forward.

The arm is then firm and extended throughout the stroke, and the only muscles that really move the arm are around the shoulder.

The rest of the muscles in the arm just hold the arm firm.

We allow the wrist to move a bit, but it’s not loose at all and we don’t flick the wrist through contact.

The wrist is not stiff, but it is firm and stable since it needs to stabilize the racket at contact.

I have already shared the one-handed backhand backswing and other illusions when I analyzed Grigor Dimitrov’s backhand with the racket digitally removed, and I invite you to check it out.

The Two-Handed Backhand Backswing Illusion

Since you’re now familiar with the whole idea of visual misinterpretations and why they happen, we’ll skip the theoretical explanations for the two-handed backhand and just look at the images.

Because we hold the racket with both hands when playing a two-handed backhand, we have less range to move our arms around. As a result, the arm movement (without the body rotation) is usually even shorter than in the case of the one-handed backhand.

The cause for the illusion is again seeing the racket move quite a lot in space from the ready position to the backswing position, which players misinterpret as being executed with the arms.

As you have learned by now, most of that racket movement in space is caused by body rotation.

To show how much the arms actually move, I will move my arms but not rotate my body.

As you can see, I barely lift the racket a bit. In fact, my arms do not go backward at all.

They go slightly forward from the ready position.

You can see that, if I add body rotation, my two-handed backswing preparation looks just fine.

As with the forehand and the one-handed backhand, there will be a drop, or a small loopy swing, that happens after the initial preparation.

As I’ve mentioned before, we don’t really “do” it. The drop just happens because we relax the arm and start engaging the body.

In conclusion, the goal of these illusion videos is to help you get a clear mental image of how a tennis forehand and backhand are executed because it’s very easy to misinterpret what you see.

Because body rotation and arm movements happen at the same time, it can be tricky to see what you should be doing with your arms when it comes to initiating the stroke.

In reality, most of the preparation and the so-called backswing of a tennis stroke simply happens as we turn the body to the side.

The arms simply lift the racket so that it can be swung downwards as the forward body rotation begins.

If you want to see more two-handed backhand illusions and observe how little the arms move compared to the racket in space, check out the Fernando Verdasco two-handed backhand analysis with the racket digitally removed.

The reason for that misinterpretation is that some parts of my body turned but other parts didn’t as I prepared for the forehand stroke.

My trunk rotated by 90 degrees, but my head didn’t turn at all since I was still looking forward.

When viewing this movement, the mind gets confused by trying to define what is “behind” since the racket was behind my head but not behind my body.

When I stayed in the open stance, then even my feet would not have moved and it would really seem like the racket was behind me.

We always need to define the racket’s position in space in relation to the trunk rather than other body parts.

The Two Movements Of The Forehand Preparation

If you observe me preparing for the forehand, first you’ll notice that my forehand preparation/backswing looks just fine.

I am not doing any different movements than usual just to prove my point.

As we prepare for the forehand stroke, we are simultaneously executing a certain movement with the arm and we’re turning our trunk to the side, rotating it around 90 degrees.

These two movements cause the racket to move quite a lot in space, meaning from ready position to the backswing position.

Because players see this big movement of the racket in space, which is held in the hand, their mind can incorrectly picture that this movement was executed mostly with the arm.

When they execute a big arm swing with body rotation, they end up swinging too much. That causes most balls to be hit too late, which results in a lack of power and control.

To reveal the illusion of the arm backswing, I am going to break down the body rotation and arm movements so that they don’t happen simultaneously but apart.

If I now only execute the arm movement of the forehand preparation and do not turn my body, I will end up just lifting my arm with a short movement where the hand is around the same height as the shoulder.

That’s all we do with the arm in a forehand backswing!

It may seem like a strangely short movement to you, but if I now add the body rotation separately, you can see that the arm and the racket end up in the correct backswing position.

In reality, most of the forehand backswing is done through body rotation, and the arm just executes a short lift of the racket.

While the arm does swing a bit more backward as we initiate the forward swing, it’s not really a voluntary movement that we “do”. It simply happens because the racket lags behind the forward body rotation.

Revealing The Short Arm Movement Of The Forehand Preparation

It may be hard to accept that the arm movement of the forehand preparation is so short, so we’ll look at a real-life example of my buddy Urban’s forehand and analyze it in detail.

What we want to see is how much the arm moves in relation to the body in order to isolate only the arm movement.

We’ll take two images of Urban’s forehand – one in ready position from the front view and one as he is prepared to hit a forehand from the side view.

You can see that, in both cases, the body/trunk is facing the camera.

If I crop the images to remove all the distracting body parts like the head and the legs, leaving only the trunk and the arm, you can already see how short the arm’s movement is in relation to the body.

If I now overlay the images so that the body in both images aligns perfectly, you can clearly see the arm’s movement in relation to the body.

The arm only lifts the racket upward in a relatively short move in relation to the body.

The illusion of the backward arm movement happens because of the body rotation. The arm and the body are moving simultaneously.

This creates a mental image (mental map) of the body movements necessary to approximately copy the movement observed. As you now realize, this mental image is incorrect, resulting in an incorrect forehand backswing technique.

Summary

I invite you to execute some shadow swings of the forehand preparation at home in front of the mirror or simply record yourself and try to observe the length of the arm movement in relation to the body.

Try to separate the arm movement and the body turning so that you can become aware of how much each of these two movements contributes to the movement of the racket in space from the initial ready position to the preparation position.

As you can see, there is no backswing on the forehand nor on any other stroke, except a type of serve where the player actually swings backward to initiate the serve.

Stay tuned for more videos on the topic of tennis illusions/misinterpretations as I will soon follow up with the backhand backswing illusion and then a series of videos covering serve, volley, and slice illusions.

You can see quite a lot of movement of the racquet on the forehand volley, but once you look only at the arm you can see very little movement, especially if you notice that most of the arm’s movement happened because of Milos’s body turn.

In the video you also saw a few unit turns in reverse and that makes it more obvious how the arm doesn’t move much on its own but that it’s moving through space only because of the body turn.

Here’s also a quick comparison of the hand versus the racquet path that might give you a better idea of what’s really going on on the forehand volley.

It’s a similar story on the backhand volley.

If we focus only on the racquet movement, we can see that the racquet moves quite a lot through space, but once we take it away and look only at the arm, we can see much less movement.

Again, the video of the unit turn in reverse shows quite well that it’s simply the body turn that makes the arm move through space and almost no arm movement of itself.

And finally just a quick comparison of the arm versus the racquet movement on the backhand volley.

Have these “no racquet” videos and images helped you volley better? Let me know your thoughts!

If all your focus is on the racquet movement which you’re trying to imitate, since you think that’s how you’ll learn correct stroke technique, then you will most likely use your arms to move the racquet in the path that you’re trying to copy and not really your body.

That’s why I’ve removed the racquet from the clip so that you can focus only on the body and notice that the preparation is really just a turn, meaning a rotation of the body around its axis.

That’s why we call it the unit turn, meaning that the body and the arms move together as one unit in this initial stage of the preparation.

This becomes even more clear if you look at this side by side comparison where I stopped the first clip when Fernando turned roughly 90 degrees from the ready position.

If you look at his body and arms position now you can see that they are almost the same as they were in the ready position.

So to conclude, whenever you hear about the unit turn in tennis, that means they the body simply turns sideways and that the arms almost don’t move at all in this first phase of preparation.

All that the player is doing is turning the body sideways but we can often misinterpret that since we see the arms and the racquet move through space and we think that the player used their arms to move the racquet.

The Simple Swing Path (If You Can See It)

The second thing Verdasco does great with his two-handed backhand is the simple swing path since he uses the more straight back preparation rather than making a loop.

The most common mistake again is paying too much attention only to the racquet which may deceive us into believing that we have to swing a lot to prepare and to hit the backhand.

As you can see the tip of the raquet makes quite a long journey from the start to finish.

But once we remove the racquet and pay attention only to the hands, we can see how simple and compact his swings are.

What’s really interesting about Fernando’s two-handed backhand is that his forward swing goes almost through the indentical path as his backswing.

I believe that that’s how Fernando gives himself the right feel for the swing path.

When he does his backswing, he feels the exact path of the racquet, meaning the curve of the swing, so that when he swings forward, he has a really fresh memory of how to swing towards the ball.

Another thing that you can see is here is how short and compact his swing is when there’s no racquet in the picture – see how short the distance is from his maximum backswing position to the contact point.

Again, looking only at the racquet might deceive you because you would feel that the distance from maximum backswing position to the contact point is really long – and that would cause you to take big swings at the ball and make it difficult for yourself to time it well and control it well.

So to create a correct mental image of your two-handed backhand, look at Fernando Verdasco’s two-handed backhand technique when there’s no racquet in the video.

Let me know in the comments below if this helps you imagine your backhand differently and if there are any benefits to that once you go on the court.

So it’s important that you see clearly that while the racquet head is quite high in relation to Dimitrov’s body, in fact the tip of the racquet is above high head, his hand has barely lifted up from his ready position and it’s still at a very comfortable height just below his chest.

You can see that clearly in this image when you observe how little has the arm actually lifted from the initial position in the ready position to its maximum height from where Grigor starts his downward swing.

2. The Racquet Lag

In this front view of Grigor’s one-handed backhand, the position that you might misinterpret is when the racquet is behind his body but the hand is in front of his body.

If you focus too much on the racquet head, you may want to move your hand way too much behind you which will coil your body too much and make it difficult to time and control the ball well.

But if you focus on the hand too much and see that it’s in front of the body, you might not create enough lag of the racquet head as you’ll want to keep the racquet also in front of the body and therefore lose on power of the stroke.

3. Getting Under The Ball

In the back view perspective of Grigor Dimitrov’s one-handed backhand this side by side image shows the difference between how much under the ball the racquet is and how much the hand is.

You’ve heard many times the instruction of getting under the ball, swinging low to high or something similar but what I’d like you to note here is that it’s not the arm that swings under the ball but it’s only the racquet head that’s dropping.

Yes, Dimitrov is hitting a more aggressive backhand here but he is still dropping the racquet head under the ball quite significantly whereas his arm hasn’t gone much under the ball.

What you may often do incorrectly when you hear about getting under the ball is to actually move your arm way too much under the ball and then having to lift it quite artificially and forcefully up towards the ball and in the process losing on the power and simply creating too much lift and too much slow top spin.

So just something to keep in mind the next time you hear your coach tell you to get under the ball.

Yes, it’s more about relaxing your hand a little bit so that the racquet head drops rather than actually moving your hand and arm way below the ball.

So have you noticed anything new looking at Grigor Dimitrov’s one-handed backhand technique in this different way of analysis when the racquet is removed from the images?

Click images to enlarge!

b) The trophy position

Would you do anything differently when it comes to your elbow, body or hand when looking at the left image compared to the right image?

Click images to enlarge!

c) The drop

Do you feel any different in your body when looking at the left image compared to the right image?

Click images to enlarge!

d) The pronation / follow-through

Would you do anything differently with your arm and hand when looking at the left image compared to the right image?

Click images to enlarge!

Have you anwered yes to any of the above questions and can you “feel” the difference in your mental image and your body in how you would imitate Roger Federer’s serving technique?

In this side-by-side picture you can see how the paths of the racquet and the hand are similar but the hand’s path is much shorter and simpler.

This is what you should be looking at when learning from the pros. Ignore the racquet and look at the whole body first and only then at the arm movement.

The racquet distracts and deceives us just like a magician who waves with one hand to distract us from his other hand with which he actually executes the trick.

That’s why I called this article a tennis illusion – the racquet creates an illusion of the forehand technique that you want to learn and distracts you from seeing the body and the arm movement.

So here’s a question for you: what did you see – perhaps for the first time – when you saw Federer hit a forehand without the racquet in hand?