Feng Tian Wei's serves

Andrew Pape Asked 12 years ago

Hi Alois,

I can't read the spin on them, and they don't seem to lead to cheap points, but her opponents seem to respect them, and I can't recall anyone attacking these serves. Wondering what's she's doing?

Her main serve is not one of the standard serves. First, she presses her thumb onto the rubber, with the bat horizontal, and after tossing the ball she seems to bring the bat under the ball and scoop it up. The bat seems to go forwards mostly, not looking as though it's generating much sidespin.

It doesn't appear to have much brush, so I guessed she was serving them all with no-spin and counting on the opponent not being able to attack no spin serves. More recently, I've seen the ball path a bit different and judging by her opponent's returns, it look like some of the serves have topspin. I'm wondering what I've been "watching", and what I haven't been "observing"?

Cheers,

Andrew.

Alois Rosario Answered 12 years ago

Hi Andrew,

SHe doesn't do a lot with her serve but she places the ball well into position and then gets the rally she is looking for. Whereas she doesn't put a lot of spin on the ball there is enough variation to make sure her opponent isn't settled.

It allows her to get into the open rally which she beats most other players at.

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Surapun Wongopasi Posted 12 years ago

In my opinion, her serves are pretty much like Wang Hao's serves. You can generally generate backspin by brushing the ball from the tip of the blade vertically down through the handle. You can also make a float serve by faking the point of ball contact with similar swinging motion. If you are an advanced player, you can vary this serve by putting the reverse pendulum spin with a very similar movement. But by coming underneath the ball, I can't understand how you can put topspin on this serve. Aloise, can you please comment or explain if my analysis is correct and how you can generate topspin with this serve?

Alois Rosario from PingSkills Posted 12 years ago

Hi Surapan,

You are right. If you go under the ball you will get backspin. Feng Tian Wei actually goes around the outside and a little on the top of the ball to get the topspin that makes it difficult for her opponents to read.

Andrew Pape Posted 12 years ago

Hi guys,

thanks for the info. I can see exactly what Surarpun means about Wang Hao's serve being much the same (apart from pen-hold grip).

To Alois, I think it'd be great if you could try to learn some of these different serves and show the rest of us how they're done. With all your experience you would be more able than myself (or other members) to learn these serves. You have explained and made videos for all the normal serves (ie one's used in the men's game), which is great, but I think you could further develop the service tutes by covering the different, non-standard, styles of serves that the top women use. It could be a work in progress, just like with the serves in the 52-week lessons.

Cheers,

Andrew.