« J’ai commencé à jouer socialement et c’était tellement amusant et c’était un environnement tellement différent du tennis et les gens étaient tellement plus gentils », dit Todd. Cela lui a donné envie de jouer davantage et elle a commencé à participer à des tournois où, à sa grande surprise, elle perdait régulièrement face aux féroces dames plus âgées contre lesquelles elle jouait. « Après ça, je me suis dit, d’accord, je vais faire ça pour de vrai et essayer de devenir bon. »
- Parris Todd, joueur de pickleball professionnel
La clé est venue dans l’apprentissage de nombreux « tirs doux » joués près du filet qui prennent votre adversaire au dépourvu. Mais avant de vous diriger vers le filet pour ces échanges typiquement vertigineux, Todd et tous les autres joueurs de pickleball doivent établir une certaine domination sur le terrain avec un service puissant et stratégique.
Le service de pickleball est littéralement le mouvement opposé du service de tennis. Au lieu de glisser au-dessus de la tête et vers le bas comme au tennis, vous servez par dessous et frappez depuis le dessous de la hanche jusqu’au-dessus de l’épaule. Le service doit atterrir dans la zone arrière opposée à l’endroit où vous servez, et une règle que beaucoup oublient, selon Todd, est que vous devez entrer en contact avec le ballon sous votre hanche.
«Je vois tout le temps des gens servir au-dessus de leurs hanches», dit Todd. «Je vois des gens servir de haut en bas. Je vois des gens qui ne suivent pas par-dessus leur épaule. Je les vois ne pas viser, ils frappent juste le service pour frapper. Donc, ce que j’aime dire aux gens si je les entraîne, c’est d’avoir un but avec votre service.
Comment pouvez-vous établir cet objectif – et cette forme meurtrière en plus ? Voici les meilleurs conseils de Todd pour développer un service de pickleball plus fort.
6 astuces pour un service de pickleball plus fort, selon un pro
1. Visez le fond du terrain
Les meilleurs joueurs de pickleball pensent plusieurs coups à l’avance, en réfléchissant à la façon dont ils lanceront un tir mortel pour marquer lorsque leur adversaire arrive de l’autre bout du terrain. Todd dit que le service est le premier mouvement stratégique car il s’agit de garder votre adversaire aussi loin que possible – et loin de la cuisine, où vous gagnerez la plupart de vos points.
“You want to try and hit it as deep as you can to keep your opponent back so they don’t come into the kitchen line quickly,” Todd says. “The slower they get into the kitchen line, the easier it is to hit it at their feet, and then they’re more likely to pop the ball up higher, so then you can hit down at their feet because you don’t want them to keep you back.”
2. Line up your body, and you’ll line up your pickleball serve
How do you ensure your ball gets where you want it to go in that opening move? With your body position. “Wherever your shoulders are pointing, you’re most likely to aim the ball,” Todd says. “If your shoulders are every which way, then the ball is going to go wherever. But if you have your shoulders pointed to where you want to aim, then it’s usually going in that spot.”
3. Keep a “Goldilocks” grip on your paddle
Todd says to think about the paddle as an extension of your arm. You need to keep some movement in your wrist, but still maintain control. If a “one” is a floppy handshake, and a “10” is a vice grip, you want to keep your handle on the paddle at a “five.”
“The paddle is an extension of your hand, » she says. Todd suggests imagining what it would be like to hit the ball if you didn’t have a paddle, and just used your hand instead. « How would you then do that with your paddle?” Todd asks. “Keeping their wrist loose and really swinging through the ball is important.”
4. Follow through with your body and your mind
Like in most sports, keeping your eye on the ball will ensure you make good contact. Following through with your body—so swinging your arm up and over your shoulder—will help with aim and power.
“I like to start with my paddle where my right hip is,” Todd says. “From there you just swing from low to high, so you’re kind of brushing up on the ball to get that spin and also that height on the ball, and then you follow through over your opposite shoulder.”
Make sure not to lift that head until after you’ve made contact.
“When you toss the ball up, you definitely want to keep your head down,” Todd says. “You want to keep it down so you see where you’re making contact, and from there you can finish and bring your head up.”
5. Build consistency before building speed
For Todd, accuracy takes precedence over speed. In fact, trying to hit too fast before you’re comfortable with your serve can mess up your aim.
“Consistency is key first,” Todd says. “Once you can get consistent and get a feel for a slower speed, then from there you can pick up the speed, because I’d rather have people make the serve than miss the serve and go for too much.”
You want to have consistent aim around the height you’re hitting the ball in addition to where you’re placing it on the court. Todd recommends aiming to hit the ball a couple feet over the net.
6. Use your warmup to practice
Most pickleball players probably aren’t playing in professional tournaments like Todd is. But not seeing the improvement you want to can still be frustrating even if you’re just playing for fun. So while it may seem counterintuitive to the recreational nature of the sport to run drills and practice, there are easy ways to try to actively hone your skills.
“You go out and play games and that’s where the fun is, right?” Todd says. “But the improvement is in the repetition and the drilling.”
If you want to find a happy medium, Todd suggests planning to show up early to a game and practicing shots for 10 minutes beforehand. A favorite serve drill she likes to do is placing cones in different places around the court, and serving to the cones, not moving on to the next spot until she can hit the cone 10 times in a row.
“Say you practice 10 shots of each thing when you warm up, well say you do that three, four times a week, that starts to add up,” Todd says. “You start to really get a feel for those shots. As long as you have intention in your warm up, then it’s kind of like you’re drilling.”
