How To Improve Tracking And Watching Of The Ball In Tennis
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Tomaz, I have been exploring vision and tennis a bit lately as I don’t think I am tracking the ball as I should.
I know you have articles on the site concerning watching the ball, but they introduce a theory, but they don’t seem to give a practical progression to improve in this area.
My reading has included the following:
http://www.eyesontennis.net/
http://www.revolutionarytennis.com/federervisiontechnique.html
http://www.arete-sports.com/
My question is what merit do you think this work has? How do you work with your students?
How to best approach integrating this into my game?
My first question to the player is: “Do you see the ball CLEARLY before you hit it?”
That in my opinion is the key. In real life and not super-human vision, we DON’T see that ball clearly when it’s coming over the net. It’s coming fast and you’re moving so you cannot focus well.
But when you set up for the shot (stop or slow down) and the ball slows down, then you CAN see the ball clearly. The only question is whether you “demand” this from yourself (and your eyes) or not.
So my approach is to remind the player to see the ball clearly and then let him figure out HOW to do that.
Sure, I may suggest to really focus on the ball after the bounce, keep the head still and not look immediately where the ball went but I will say this ONLY if I have to. The player needs to have an empty mind when playing and not full of instructions and commands on what to do with his head…
I might also ask if he “saw” the disappearance of the ball. 
It sounds funny, but the point is this: if you keep your head still at the point of contact, you will see the ball there and then a split second later the ball will not be there.
So while you’re focused on a certain area in space, you see the ball there and then it disappears – meaning you saw the disappearance.
But if you turn your head too quickly, you won’t see this. You’ll see only the ball coming from somewhere behind you into your field of vision.
The next step in learning is becoming aware of the benefits of this. You don’t have to track the ball and keep your head still because you read this on tennismindgame.com.
No, you do it because it enables you to hit the ball cleaner and with better accuracy. You can actually play better. But if you want to see something, you have to look for it!
So your next step is to look for improvement when you are able to see the ball well at the point of contact and see how poorly you hit the ball when don’t see the ball clearly or keep your head still.
Only when you establish this cause / effect connection in your mind, you’ll be able to make this new “technique” automatic.
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February 17th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
i found your expression of seeing the ball clearly very helpful in volleying at the net. this is the weakest part of my game and in one practice session of trying to see the ball clearly i improved dramatically. thanks! looking forward to more tips.
February 27th, 2009 at 4:07 am
Thank you very much for your tips! I am very excited to try them out during my game tomorrow!