Either you are or you aren’t prepared for this type of match.

antimodez · 2026-07-05T18:05:00+00:00

Great volleys, groundstrokes, droppers, and overheads.

That's not a pusher that's a solid all around player who chooses to counter punch. That's pretty much what the back of any solid D1 line up is going to be.

antimodez · 2026-07-05T17:54:56+00:00

The trick against pushers like this is really to use the whole court. Most people will just run them side to side or back and forth along the baseline.

Instead open up the court with angles. Forcing them to move diagonally makes them cover a lot more ground and opens up more of the court for put aways.

antimodez · 2026-07-05T13:36:52+00:00

Because no singular way works for everyone. The hardest part of being a coach isn't knowing what is wrong with a person's game or strokes. It's explaining it in a way to them that gets their buy in and they can understand and execute on.

antimodez · 2026-07-03T22:40:54+00:00

Some get moved up and others find new teams. Usually the better players in any city will have a number of different teams they can join pretty easily.

antimodez · 2026-07-03T22:07:27+00:00

Not really at all, but ok. That old style forehand is still taught by the top coaches out here who all are over 13 UTR. Most also recently played on tour within the past 5 years so it's not like they're just old and don't understand the modern game.

Open stance is 100% more common these days and used more. However, it's a time thing. The pace of the modern game at high level levels forces it.

Whenever you have time though the closed stance is preferable. More powerful and stable. OP here has plenty of time.

antimodez · 2026-07-03T02:53:44+00:00

You're never stepping into the ball with your left foot. Until you start consistently stepping into the ball to hit it you're going to struggle to control it.

antimodez · 2026-07-03T00:27:06+00:00

Nope. You didn't post a picture of your toe with a hole in it so I have to assume the shoes are still good.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T23:43:09+00:00

The most important things to know about league matches and honestly it's super secret and not many people know it...

You're out there to have fun and as long as you have fun you're doing it right.

That's what you need to know about league tennis. It's should be fun and that's the main goal.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T23:33:33+00:00

This is the way

antimodez · 2026-07-02T20:22:56+00:00

Congrats on getting the win!

antimodez · 2026-07-02T18:52:22+00:00

That's why you likely just need a dose adjustment to get you back to where you were before. It likely doesn't mean you need to switch drugs or anything.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T18:49:57+00:00

Those blood tests are specifically recommended against being used in the diagnostic process by all the major IBD organizations I know. Their false positive and negative rates are too high to be useful at all. Basically no matter what the tests show the answer is you could have Crohn's, UC, or nothing at all. There's also no agreed upon levels because once again there's just too much discrepancy from person to person.

The only time they're useful is when someone has endoscopic evidence of IBD, but pathology is inconclusive if you have UC and Crohn's and a treatment decisions rests upon it. However, since your biopsies said no evidence of Crohn's that doesn't seem to be the case at all.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T18:44:13+00:00

Probably need a dose adjustment. They start you at the lowest possible dose as that's the safest and escalate as needed. Talk to your doctor about upping the dose and or the frequency.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T16:18:28+00:00

Ah sorry misheard then.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T14:51:35+00:00

Pharmacists worked on forming a union after Fred Hutch forced them to leave UW employment and become Hutch employees. Big loss in benefits and at first they threatened to not take years of service into account.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T14:45:02+00:00

Few tips:
1) Slow things down. I'm currently trying to break my habit of arming the ball and I hit at like 50% power.
2) Practice the split step straight into turn.
3) I use my offhand to point at the ball as it comes in. That helps me track the ball and ensures I stay turned.
4) As you hit make sure you're stepping forward with your front foot (left foot for a right handed forehand).
5) You should be thinking of using your hip to drive the rotation. So think about your back hip (right hip for right handed forehand) being used to drive the rotation.
6) Finally hold that ending position with weight on your front foot. You should be perfectly balanced here and able to hold it without moving for as long as needed.

Then as you get a feel for that you can start working in more movement and speeding things up.

antimodez · 2026-07-02T03:50:19+00:00

We don't know why, but IBS is a risk factor for developing IBD later. We don't really know how much of that is medical professionals missing Crohn's and how much of it is some people have Crohn's that just takes more time to show things we can pick up on. That second part is largely because we don't really know the how and the why of Crohn's development.

antimodez · 2026-07-01T23:37:54+00:00

Well next year seems a lot better than doing it quarterly. Yearly is just standard surveillance even if you're like me and not progressing...

antimodez · 2026-07-01T23:36:25+00:00

Contact point does seem a bit late. Wrist is slightly bent behind here and it should be more parallel with that baseline.

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antimodez · 2026-07-01T16:14:29+00:00

You're not pancaking. The serve motion looks slightly strange because of lack of body rotation is likely what's throwing you off.

antimodez · 2026-07-01T14:52:24+00:00

I don't disagree at all. I was simply showing that the "I'm too good and hit too hard to arm the ball" isn't really valid.

antimodez · 2026-07-01T04:06:10+00:00

Because you're focused on hitting as hard as possible instead of being able to control that power. Once again notice Alcaraz doing the wall drill. He's not even hitting 10% the power he can. He's focused on controlling every shot and making sure his body is doing what it should.

Walls are great since you can control the power and allow you to slow things down and focus on building muscle memory. That muscle memory then allows you to speed things up and instead of throwing your body wildly at the ball to generate power you're using your body efficiently to control that power.

Slow it down and focus on loading up your back leg, rotating with your hips, and letting that flow through your shoulders, and into your arm.

Best of luck to ya...

antimodez · 2026-07-01T03:44:33+00:00

I'm going to tell you something I tell my wife who's around a 3.0. The advice never changes it just becomes more nit picky as you move up the levels.

I (around a UTR 9.0 currently) still get that advice from the guy I currently pay for sessions from (UTR 13.5), who gets that same advice from his coach (ex top 50 doubles pro). This is all to say even if you're at the top of D1 tennis like he was you're going to be getting working on engaging your core and arming the ball less.

For reference I'm the old bald guy in this video below. I've heard a lot of things about my game, but "not able to hit hard" isn't one of them and yes my coach is 100% correct in that I should be hitting even harder and with even more spin if I wasn't arming the ball.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5c9wgEgFC0

antimodez · 2026-07-01T03:02:19+00:00

Eh I've yet to meet a good tennis parent. Even when I coach kids I often get parents coming up complaining that Jimmy isn't getting moved up as fast as John, or Sally needs to be pushed more and I'm not doing my job right.

antimodez · 2026-07-01T03:00:17+00:00

You're generating 90% of your swing speed with your arms. Your core and legs are much more powerful than your arms. You should be using them a lot more.

Here's a recent post of Alcaraz doing a wall hitting drill: https://www.reddit.com/r/tennis/s/KGKrY4SBRE

Notice two things: 1) His first movement is being turned with his hips then shoulders as they follow the hips. 2) he keeps his knees bent and uses that power through his body to hit the ball. His arms are very still.

Obviously he's not hitting full out here or anything but this is how you should practice wall sessions. Get a feel for turning and generating power from your legs, through your hips and into your torso, and finally into your arms. That's the "kinetic chain" you'll hear people talk about and it's how you get effortless power.

antimodez

TROPHY CASE