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Stable Alignment II: The One-Handed Topspin Backhand

Daryl Fisher

This is the second of a series of tennis instruction articles on the topic of “stable alignment” (first article), and this installment focuses on achieving stable alignment with the one-handed topspin backhand. Achieving stable alignment involves the relative positioning of parts of your body as you hit the ball so as to create the greatest stability and resilience, which in turn protects the body's weaknesses. Stable alignment in relation to your one-handed topspin backhand will help you handle and generate power, make topspin easier, and help you handle high balls. (What follows will be specific to the topspin backhand except where underspin is specifically mentioned.)

Grips

Click photo: Stanislas Wawrinka has a model one-handed topspin backhand. Notice the classic Eastern backhand grip.

For most players, the primary challenge for achieving stability with the one-handed backhand is finding the proper grip. For what follows, you will need to know what the Continental and Eastern backhand grips are. As a quick overview, if the racquet is perpendicular to the ground, then the Continental grip puts a right handed player’s index finger base knuckle on the 1 o’clock bevel, and the Eastern backhand grip puts the index finger’s base knuckle on the top, or 12 o’clock, bevel. If that is not clear, there are references to and images of the grips available through TennisOne.

Moving forward, I will be encouraging a grip shift toward the Eastern backhand grip. Please let me be clear that I am not downgrading the Continental grip. Though I am not aware of any pros currently on the tour that use the Continental grip for their one-handed topspin backhands, there are many excellent tennis players throughout the history of tennis that did. As I recall, tennis greats Rod Laver, John McEnroe, and Ivan Lendl all used it. Given the success of these players, it is clearly not wrong to hit a one-handed topspin backhand with the Continental grip, but it requires a very fluid swing or a lot of strength or both. I am encouraging a move toward the Eastern backhand not because the Continental grip is wrong, but more for the sake of maximizing stability.

Click photo: At the pause in this video, you can see Nicolas Almagro leading with the edge of his hand, not with the back of his hand.  The back of his hand is directed upward.

Generally speaking, the Continental grip is perfect for underspin, but this grip makes aggressive topspin difficult for most people on both the forehand and backhand sides, and it makes hitting topspin high balls particularly difficult. It can be done, but both the topspin forehand and backhand can be made more stable with grip adjustments. (High balls can be easily handled with the Continental grip by hitting no spin or underspin, though generally less aggressively.)

The Edge of the Hand

To achieve maximum stability with the one-handed topspin backhand, one simply needs a grip that will allow the racquet face to remain relatively perpendicular to the ground while the edge of the dominant hand leads the motion. The edge of the hand is the area of the hand that is opposite the thumb and between the little finger and the wrist. In martial arts, this is the area that would be used for what is called a knifehand strike, which is more commonly known as a karate chop.

To lead with the edge of the hand tends to conflict with the common conception of the backhand, possibly just because of the name of the stroke, “backhand.” I know that when I was a beginning player, I imagined the back of my hand going toward the ball like a backhand slap.


Justine Henin leads with the back edge of her hand as shown in the first two photos.  The third photo shows the upward tilt of her hand that occurs as a result of her extreme Eastern backhand grip.

Close to the Eastern Grip

The grip that most easily enables the edge of the hand to lead the one-handed topspin backhand is something close to an Eastern backhand grip. The exact grip is not important, just the stable alignment is.

The possibility of more than one grip being acceptable might seem strange, but consider for a moment that many years ago it was fairly common for people to hit forehands with the Continental grip. As mentioned above, this grip makes aggressive topspin difficult for most people. Multiple grips—the Eastern, extreme Eastern, or semi-Western forehand grips—have been shown to be better for these purposes. In this same way, the exact grip for the topspin one-handed backhand is not as important as its ability to achieve stability.

Feel It

To feel what leading with the edge of your dominant hand means, you can try a number of experiments, though please be careful as a weak alignment can truly lead to an injury!

One experiment is to simply push against a heavy object. Put the back of your hand against a heavy object and push. Again, do not push too hard given the risk of injury! The harder you push, the more the wrist becomes at risk for bending into a position that is at best weak and at worst prone to an injury. Alternatively, if you put the edge of your hand against the same heavy object and push, you will find that your wrist might be slightly pushed back, but only into a position that is still stable and strong. With this alignment, you should be able to lean your whole body into the push with no risk of injury. Look to Roger Federer or Justine Henin as examples of this stable wrist alignment.

Click photo: Simulating a topspin backhand with an elastic band using a continental grip can fold the wrist back and into a position of weakness. This increases the chance of injury. Note the difference using the stronger Eastern backhand grip.

High Balls

Consider another experiment. Imagine that you are pulling a stretchy exercise band from the floor in a diagonal movement that mimicked a one-handed topspin backhand (like starting a lawn mower, the exercise band is attached low to the ground and it is pulled somewhat up as well as away). If you do that with the back of the hand pointing in the direction that you are pulling, you will have a weak alignment at the wrist making for a limitation on power as well as the risk of injury. If you make the motion leading with the edge of your hand (so that the back of your hand is visible to you), however, then you will have stable alignment like what you would need for hitting high topspin backhands (and perhaps the best way to start a lawn mower).

I have seen instructors place a quarter on the back of the hand to demonstrate how the palm of the hand faces down on a one-handed topspin backhand, and this is a good introduction to the Eastern backhand grip, but the student should also learn that the quarter should not remain in place for high backhands. The quarter would slide off of your hand toward you. This might seem a bit confusing at first, but recall that what is important is that the edge of the hand should lead the topspin motion in order to achieve a strong alignment.

I have one more experiment for you to try. Find a stairway with a railing on either side of the steps so that you can do the following experiment regardless of left or right hand dominance. In order to feel what it is to have the edge of your hand lead the motion for a one-handed underspin backhand, first place your hand on top of a rail so that you can slide your hand from a higher to a lower position. Keep your palm flat against the rail. Notice that the back of your hand does not lead the slide down, the edge of your hand does. You would do this with a Continental grip for a nice underspin one-handed backhand.

Conversely, in order to feel what it is to hit a high topspin one-handed backhand, place your palm on top of a rail so that you can slide your hand from a lower to higher position. Again, notice how the back of your hand does not lead the motion, the edge of your hand does (and how a quarter placed on the back of your hand would slide off). You would do this with something close to an Eastern backhand grip for a nice topspin one-handed backhand.

Relaxation or Tension

If you have read any of my previous articles, you might know that I am a proponent of relaxed strokes (Relaxed Hands and Good Technique), but I would like to add that while I do not encourage tensely pushing through a shot, many people like the two-handed backhand because they can push through. When it matters to you, you will find that you can push through a one-handed topspin backhand if you find stable alignment. While tension will detract from your ability to hit with accuracy and power on any stroke, both relaxed and tensely pushed motions will benefit from stable alignment.

Click photo: Bob Bryan demonstrates what a compact one-handed topspin backhand looks like.  He is not likely tense for this shot, but you can see that, while it would be less powerful and accurate if it were tense, at least it would still work.

My Hope

I hope I have made the one-handed topspin backhand less mysterious for you with this article. My experience has been that many people love to hit the shot (and they like how they look while they hit it), but that occasionally the challenge of finding stable alignment gets in the way of the shot’s effectiveness. If you try a grip closer to the Eastern backhand grip, and then work on leading with the edge of your hand, it might feel a little funny at first, but you will soon find that stability is no longer an issue.