🥒🏓 A Must Have Speed Up Attack

1️⃣ Get set early, pause, keep paddle in front (so you do not launch it long and give your opponent an early read), and sell your opponent you are going to attack down the line.

2️⃣ Whip your forearm and elbow & hit the right side of the ball, to maximize pace, spin, deception while keeping the ball in play 👍🏻
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🥒🏓 Missing Resets At Transition? 👇🏻

⭐️ Split step right before your opponent strikes the ball. When the opponent is hitting the ball from a spot in which they can hit the ball downward, be sure to prep as if you are fielding a baseball ground ball, with your weight low in your glutes.

⭐️ Keep your feet planted. This will maximize your hand eye coordination & keep your head steady. The more you move, the tougher it will become to absorb the pace of the ball

⭐️ Squat with your glutes sinking to the floor. Similar to baseball, it`s easier to work from the ground-up to field a ground ball than it is to be standing with your glove at your knees and then reacting downward. Usually, the ball goes under your legs in that situation. In pickleball, if you are too upright, you will be late to getting low, causing you to hit net or using your wrists to get the ball over, which will cause the ball to go too high and deep, leading to the opponent nailing an overhead. In addition, this will take weight off of your knees 👍🏻

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Sometimes the most memorable point of the game isn’t the flashy one…
Fun games thepickleballheaven

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🥒🏓 A "Must Add" To Your Pickleball Playbook 📓

1️⃣ Left side player tucks right shoulder to hide where they may go with their shot. Then, they hit an aggressive top spin dink, aiming about 2 feet inside the crosscourt corner of the kitchen. By tucking the shoulder, the crosscourt opponent may focus on countering a middle attack rather than position their feet to be able to ATP this aggressive dink. Thus, they will be forced to attempt a defensive dink while being off balanced and pushed off the court a bit

2️⃣ The right side player reads the opponent is off balanced, understands they should not dink down the line due to the Erne threat. Thus, they will probably dink at their inside foot. In response, the right side player shuffles left, gets set early, in a position, tucking the left shoulder, so they can open up 3 solid options 👇🏻

✅ Dink to the right corner of the kitchen. This is solid if the opponent over commits to the middle. This can set up an Erne or a better speed up on the next ball

✅ Dink to the left corner of the kitchen. This, too, is a solid option if the cross court opponent over commits to the middle. This can set up an Erne for your partner or a better speed up opportunity for your team

✅ You may use the space your partner opened up in the middle for you to hit a low speed up. You may end up hitting a clean winner on this due to your opponents anticipating the previous 2 options. You may also witness the situation in the clip where the players are late to counter and end up trying to compensate by swinging fast late, causing the ball to go out of bounds as the ball they are striking is too low to land in bounds. Knowing this, I am easily able to anticipate the ball is heading out of bounds despite everything happening at a fast pace in real time
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🥒🏓 Backhand Speed Up Tip I Learned From Pickleball Professional Ryan Fu ryanfupb

When you are 👇🏻
1️⃣ Standing near the left side line
2️⃣ Hitting a two hand backhand speed up off of the bounce
3️⃣ Aiming either down the line or at your opponents right shoulder or hip

✅ Take speed off of your speed up. This will 👇🏻

1️⃣ Increase the margin for error in a situation where the margin for error is tight given the net is at its highest point + the side line is near by + the distance to the baseline is the shortest, as you are not hitting this cross court, which allows you to hit the ball a few feet further

2️⃣ Throw your opponent`s timing off on their counter if they anticipate and look to slide to hit a one hand backhand counter

3️⃣ Give you more time to set yourself and react to the next ball - either hitting a 2nd attack or resetting a ball countered low at your feet

I appreciate ryanfupb for helping me improve upon many skills and sharing valuable insights in the lesson I took 🙏🏻💯
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🥒🏓 A Forehand Speed Up Combo To Add To Your Left Side Toolbox 🧰

1️⃣ You or your partner pull one of the opponents wide with an angled aggressive dink.

2️⃣ When the opponent attempts to neutralize the dink, but ends up hitting a flat dink to the left side player`s forehand, they should set themselves early and pause. This may cause the opponents to hesitate to pinch hard to the middle, believing you may pull them out wide again with angled aggressive dink.

3️⃣ The left side player should speed up to a location that requires the other team to reach for their counter, as this will result in the opponent`s counter being weaker while also putting the other team in an off balanced position to respond to your next ball.

4️⃣ Split step while keeping your hands in front after your forehand off-the-bounce speed up, to hit the next ball cross court behind the left side opponent, as they would have just slid over to the middle with their forehand, making it difficult to respond to your next shot 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 What To Do When Your Partner Hits A Low 3rd Shot Drop

1️⃣ Move into the transition zone, ahead of your partner to analyze the trajectory of the ball. This allows you to adapt to any ball your partner hits on their 3rd shot to put yourself in the best position for the 5th shot.

2️⃣ Once you read the trajectory of the ball is going to land at your opponents knees or lower, move up a couple of steps further to the kitchen line.

3️⃣ When you are setting your feet before the opponent strikes the 4th shot, keep in mind what your opponent may think and the options they have to prep yourself best.

⭐️ They may try to avoid you at all costs because they see how close you are, so you can then set yourself closer to the middle, looking to intercept any balls they attempt to hit to your partner that you can attack out of the air, as you see in the clip above.

⭐️ They may try to hit the ball behind you. As long as you are set and balanced, you can get behind any dink they hit behind you. If they attack behind you, their ball will be traveling upwards, so as long as you are set, balanced, & watching their paddle face, you should be able to counter this ball effectively. You can even juke middle or shade middle early to bait this attack.

⭐️ Finally, they may just dink the ball to your partner who will either be at the transition zone or the kitchen line, depending where they struck their 3rd shot from, which means the opponent has effectively neutralized your threat as a poacher. At the same time, your threat has led to your partner receiving a ball they can easily hit a 5th shot drop / dink in response to even the rally that was earlier shifted in their favor before the 3rd shot was hit 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 "Miss-Hitting" The "Sweet Spot" On Your 3rd Shot Drops?

1️⃣ Strike the ball when it is falling from it`s apex rather than striking the ball when it`s on its way up. The ball will be traveling slower & our eyes can gain more intel on the trajectory, speed & spin of the ball coming our way.

2️⃣ Consider the height at which you feel most comfortable striking the ball. Then, be sure to always focus on moving your feet, becoming balanced before contact, and situating yourself so you are always striking the ball from the same arm slot. This will allow you to hit the 3rd shot drop on your paddles sweet spot more often while also landing them at a higher rate.

3️⃣ I often see people "miss-hit" their 3rd shot drops when their opponent slice their return of serve. Usually, it`s because players realize there is spin on the ball and instinctively try to take the ball on the short hop. This will usually result in the player hitting the net. Instead, let the ball travel to you, get lower than usual, and apply a more "down-up" motion with your top spin drop. You will instantly notice that your drop will dip more, accelerate more, and become a nightmare for your opponents to handle 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 Missing 3rd Shot Drops Into The Net?

The first challenge I throw to myself or clients is to aim deeper. See what happens.

In this case, when she started aiming deeper with her drop shots, not afraid of hitting the drop too deep, she landed 37 in a row.

Is this always the remedy? No. But if the player continues to hit net with the drop shot, at least they will know it`s not because of where they are aiming after making this mindset shift. Therefore, they can then shift the focus towards their paddle face, footwork, balance, follow through, when they are striking the ball, etc. which are amongst some of the other key variables impacting 3rd shot drop shot execution 👍🏻

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🥒🏓 The Aggressive Half Volley Dink

Some of the toughest dinks to handle are the ones hit with decent pace at our shoe laces.

Do we take it out of the air?
Or step back to take it off of the bounce?
Or do we hit a half volley scoop shortly after the ball has bounced?

If a decision is not made in time, we will pop up the ball or hit the ball into the net.

I tend to look to take these balls out of the air instead of stepping back, unless I know the ball is not hit with much pace, which means I will have enough time to step back.

However, there are times where I anticipate I can take it out of the air, but realize shortly that I cannot reach comfortable. In addition, there are situations, such as the one`s above, which I recognize I`m not set in time to take the ball out of the air. In these situations, we must resort to the emergency dink known as the half volley, which is a dink hit shortly after it has bounced.

Many times I see people hit these balls defensively. However, if we

1️⃣ Keep the paddle head relatively neutral (not pointing up or down)

2️⃣ Maintain stability with our legs and arm

3️⃣ Use the pace of the ball hit to us as a guide to how hard we can this ball without hitting it too deep or short

4️⃣ 🎯 Aim about 1 foot inside the kitchen line from a depth standpoint

We can reverse the balance of power in the rally from going to ourselves being in a tough position to putting our opponents in a tough position by executing this shot 👍🏻
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🥒🏓 Biggest Difference Between 5.5 and 5.0 Pickleball 🥒🏓

Throughout my development as a coach and competitor, the biggest difference I have analyzed between 5.5 & 5.0, on average, is the know-how & ability to set up and execute 2 shot combos. Studying and drilling such combos and testing out in rec play is undoubtedly necessary to take that jump nowadays. As you can see in the tape here, each speed up hit by Tom Romano and Roger Mosteller was designed as a set up for their 2 shot combo. Given that, it is no surprise to me that their DUPR averages out to 5.50 and that they consistently place well in open level 5.0+ tourneys.

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🥒🏓 What To Do When They Dink To Your Shins

1️⃣ Split step, so you have a stable base. Stay 🏋️ down throughout the shot.

2️⃣ Hit the bottom right side of the ball with a slightly open 🏓 paddle face

3️⃣ Consider like you are turning the 📻 audio / radio down in your car - the forearm rotation for this stroke is tiny, as you are using the pace of the ball dinked / dropped to you. If you try to do more, you will hit the ball into the net or out.

4️⃣ 🎯 Aim about 1 foot inside the corner of the crosscourt kitchen. This will cause your opponent to abruptly stop their momentum going towards the middle to shift their weight towards the sideline to return your shot. Your shot may cause

✅ Missed dinks
✅ Flat, dead dinks, as your opponent may be off balanced attempting to return your shot
✅ Your opponents to be on ⛸️ ice skates, as this shot should open up a plethora of options for what you want to do with the next ball if they return this shot back to you 👍🏻

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