Do you want to learn how to spin the ball? If you do, this blog is for you.
We’ve gotten a few questions on how to learn how to spin the ball when you first start playing pickleball.
You’re pretty much learning the basics, the fundamentals, and for the majority of the players when you go out there and learn you’re hitting just with an upward motion. There’s not a lot of spin on the ball.
For example, when you’re dinking, you’re hitting pretty flat and that means there’s not a lot of side spin, there’s not a lot of slice, or any other spin.
All you’re doing is lifting the ball. This can be a very good and consistent dink but if you want to start adding different spins to your return then this is a little introduction that you can try on the wall.
You’ll be able to get feel for the ball and what the ball is doing when you are putting a certain type of spin on it.
Today we’re going to talk about some forehands and some backhands. We’re going to talk about the beginning of side spin. And, for the backhand we’ll touch on the beginning of a slice.
Let’s start with the forehand side.
We want you to do remember this is just the beginning stages for you to develop and get a feel for the ball going from right to left off your paddle.
Instead of a low to high motion, we want you to come a little bit from the right side and across just slightly. What you’re going to notice is that you’re going to feel the ball brush off your paddle a little bit.
You’re going to feel a little bit of spin.
So, instead of going low to high you’re going right to left and this is just the beginning of a forehand slice.
Keep it really compact. You’re not going to be cutting it really hard. You just want to really feel the way the ball reacts off your paddle.
This just the beginning of a slice. Then you can start backing up. Make sure you have your feet set before you hit the ball and also that your contact point is out in front no matter what shot in pickleball you’re hitting.
It’s really important that your contact point is out in front.
You should also be keeping your eye on the ball.
Now, do the same thing for the backhand side. Instead of just hitting it up you can start practicing the beginnings of your backhand slice.
Instead of just pushing it up by going from a low to high motion, you’re going to come from the side. For example, if you’re a right-hander, you’re going to start towards your left side of your hip and then you’re going to come across to the right side of your hip.
It’s just a smooth motion and you’ll notice it’s actually going more from up to down. Up to down and across.
As we said, you should be making sure your contact point is out in front.
This is just the beginning stages of a slice. You could just play around with it and see how your ball reacts off the paddle.
The main thing is you want to make sure you’re getting good clean hits. You’re not hitting the frame, hitting the top of your paddle, etc. Hits off the sweet spot.
This will develop your skill on putting spin on the ball. This is called a slice/under spin.
You’re not doing anything crazy, you’re not chopping on it or anything. You just want a nice, smooth motion, across your body.
For those of you beginners who are trying to develop some side spin or under spin on your cross-court dinks and things like that, this is something that you can do and develop by yourself on any wall.
Get the feel of how the ball reacts. You can actually see when you’re hitting a spin off the wall. The ball will turn and then it will hit off the wall the other way.
Once you go back further into the court, you’re going to have a longer swing, a longer follow-through.
What we discussed in this blog is just the beginning stages focused more on dinking. In this case everything will be short and compact.
Go out there and try it out if you want to develop some spin on your shots, on your dinks.
This is a great way to start doing that.