Abstract
We compared the serve toss of different types of serve when tennis players served from the ad-court. They used different spin on the ball and various ball placements in the opponent’s service box. Our aim was to compare the toss in different types of serve between a competitive (local tournament) player and a professional player, from the point of view of the receiving player, when they served from the ad-court. One professional and one competitive tennis player (both right handed) were observed while serving different types of serve to various locations of the opponent’s service box. We used a high-speed camera, which was placed opposite to the server in the position of a receiving player. The results showed that the players do not use the same toss for each type of serve. The professional player had a bigger range of racket-ball contact point on horizontal axis (32 cm) of the various types of first serves, compared to the competitive player (only 24 cm). The toss of the kick serve had similar characteristics between both players (the racket-ball contact point was observed to be mostly to the right, from the view of receiver). Neither the professional nor the competitive player showed a stable profile of toss. In some cases, the receiving players could anticipate the type of the serve from the server’s toss.
Highlights
Every rally in tennis begins with a serve
The mean of the competitive player’s serve speed was 16 kph lower compared to the professional player
We found differences in toss execution between the professional and the competitive player
Summary
Every rally in tennis begins with a serve. If he/she misses the second serve too, it is a double fault and he/she loses a point. The serve is one of the most difficult strokes in tennis and has already been described The serve motion starts with the ball toss, which is crucial for the whole stroke. Gilet et al (2009) say the serve and the return are the strokes that most affect the results of tennis matches, even on clay courts (the slowest surface). The ball speed after the serve can often reach over 200 kph in professional tournaments. This means that the receiving player has to react very quickly. Even though the ball decelerates on the way to the receiver, the ball travels to him/her in 0.5–1.2 s, depending on the serve quality, ball spin and surface (Dunlop, 2000; Kleinöder, 1997)
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