Physics of the Serve
Serving
Esteban Mendez Asked 11 years ago
If I'm trying to give off a really fine contact on the serve for a really spinny ball, is it safe to say that slower and shorter serves will yield more power on the spin? If I attempt a spin serve on the ball and it goes fast, is it because it has a more flat contact resulting in more speed but less spin?
Alois Rosario Answered 11 years ago
Hi Esteban,
The finer the contact the more likely you are to get the ball to spin. If you contact the ball flat then the ball will go faster. Ideally you want to contact the ball fine and faster to get the ball to spin around faster.
Thoughts on this question
Become a free member to post a comment about this question.
Esteban Mendez Posted 11 years ago
So what you're saying is that an ideal serve has to be fast but spinny?
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 11 years ago
Almost. The bat needs to be moving fast when it contacts the ball. Because you are brushing the ball fine, the ball will not travel fast.
The ideal serve is actually spinny but short.
Esteban Mendez Posted 11 years ago
But the ball itself doesn't go fast right? I would find it quite difficult to serve a ball fast and short at the same time. I'm saying this because I noticed that my sidespin serve was more effective when I brushed with more spin, but I also noticed that it was a slower serve and it was short also. When I tried a fast sidespin serve, it was less effective because it had less spin on it because some of that speed had to go to a flat contact on the ball unless I'm doing it wrong.
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 11 years ago
Aha... the ball can travel reasonably fast with a lot of spin. The faster the better... but you must maintain the spin on it. If you think about the fast spinning ball hitting the other bat slowly, it would be easier to control than the ball spinning fast and hitting their bat fast. It is a fine line and a very advanced skill to be able to serve the ball spinning fast, moving quite fast and still staying short.
Esteban Mendez Posted 11 years ago
A fine line? So this means it has an optimized balance between speed and spin? Is it not the spinniest and not the fastest, but still having a reasonable speed and spin? Or it is both the fastest and the spinniest?
Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 11 years ago
Hi Esteban,
Take a look at this previous Ask the Coach video response on How to do a short fast serve.