Grip pressure points

Gerard McCarthy Unknown Asked 15 years ago

Hi Jeff & Alois

I use a shakehand grip with the index finger and thumb on and along the lower edge of the rubber. I use a light grip that avoids tension in the lower arm.

In doing cross court FH to FH or BH to BH fast counterhit drills, I noticed that I sometimes don't connect cleanly with stray balls that go to the other side.

On paying closer attention to my grip, I noticed a slight difference on BH compared to FH. After many BH counters in a row, I was sliding my thumb up the rubber a little and moving my pressure on the rubber to the thumb, behind the bat.

On the FH side, the main pressure on the rubber is centred on the last part of the index finger.

With a view to improvement, I tried keeping the same feeling on both FH and BH, with the main pressure on the rubber in the end part of the index finger. I found this much better immediately, with better directional control on the BH, and greater ease swapping between FH and BH during fast counter hitting close to the table.


Would you recommend that I keep the grip identical with the same pressure and feeling on both FH and BH?

Would this be good to recommend to young players?
i.e. recommend that the end of the index finger is the main pressure point on the rubber itself.

 

Jeff Plumb Answered 15 years ago

Hi Gerard,

I think initially it is very sound advice for beginners to keep the same grip for both forehand and backhand. The reason being that it simplifies switching between forehand strokes and backhand strokes.

Having given that advice, there are many players who have a slight variation between backand and forehand grip. Normally the variation will be a slight adjustment in the angle of the racket in the hand. As long as it is a natural change between backhand and forehand that occurs automatically without thinking, there is no real problem with this.

One of the main reasons that the index finger is placed on the rubber in the shakehand grip is that it provides you with a lot of feedback on the exact angle of your bat during your strokes but I've never really thought about the end of the finger being the main pressure point. From what you described above for your backhand, it seems to me that when the thumb moves up the back of the racket, there is a tendency to change the backhand stroke into more of a push using part of your upper arm. When you slide the thumb back down it is more natural to play the stroke in the correct manner. So I suspect that the improved consistency is more to do with the production of the stroke than the pressure at the end of the index finger.