Will Hamilton: Once you hit your split step, you need to now move towards the tennis ball. The very first step you take coming out of your split step is called the first step movement. Behind me, when I hit my split step, I'm going to hit a forehanded again, I'm left handed, so step out with my outside foot, my left foot. Now my foot when I step out is more or less parallel with the baseline and I'm going to push off in the direction that I move into the tennis ball with my inside foot, my right foot.
Let's watch this one more time, coming out of the split step, I step out of my left foot, it's now parallel to baseline and I'm pushing off with my inside, my right foot. From here, now I'm going to maybe run to the tennis ball and maybe take a couple adjusting steps depends on what kind of ball I'm getting. What you may have noticed is that this movement, this step is very, very similar to the pivot in the shoulder turn on either the forehand or the backhand that's the thing we've talked about in pretty much every single ground stroke video. You're right, there are the same motion when you are moving laterally along the baseline, if you're moving to the side, if you're moving up or you're moving back then the foot work is a little bit different, but if you're moving side to side then the first step movement and the pivot and the shoulder turn are virtually the same thing.
Behind we've got Gael Monfils hitting his split step. This picture and the next one we're about to show you are the exact same pictures we used in the pivot and shoulder video of the forehand section. Now having hit a split step, Monfils steps out with his outside foot, his right foot in this case since he is riding and he is pushing off with his left foot, his inside foot in the direction of the tennis ball, that's going to let him get to the ball as quickly as possible. If we go back to the split step, there is next picture here, again you could consider this the pivot and shoulder turn, but that's not what we're focusing on here. We were focusing on is the foot work, he is stepping out with his outside foot and pushing off with the inside foot. This foot work is what he needs to do to get to the ball as fast as he can.
Transcription by:
Scribe4you Transcription Services