How to Hit a Slice Serve in Tennis

Video Transcript

"Hi, my name's Lincoln Ward, I'm a USPTA Certified Tennis Teaching Pro here in Austin, Texas with Lonestar Tennis Company. Today we're going to talk about how to hit a slice serve. The slice serve is a very effective weapon to add to your tennis arsenal. It all starts off with the ball toss. Instead of tossing the ball into the court as you would a flat serve, you want to move your arm to where it lines up with this base line. You're going to throw it along the base line, straight up, when you go to swing you're going to do your normal stroke, but instead of throwing your racket into the court, you're going to throw your racket out towards the side fence like a tomahawk. What ends up happening is that, instead of driving through the ball, you are coming across the side and scratching the side, hence the term slicing the ball. You're slicing through the ball to create a different type of shot. When you hit the ball, it should have a low arc. So, it won't have this huge arc, it will go straight and kind of curve at the body. If you're right handed, it should curve out to your left. If you're left handed, it should curve out to your right, generally. But, I can not stress too much that a ball toss is everything in your slice serve. If you throw the ball, if you release the ball below your nose, you're going to reach out too far and you're not going to have a successful slice. Same thing goes if you reach, if you let go of the ball above your nose, it's going to go back behind your head and you're going to hit more of a top spin serve than a slice. So, remember, toss the ball along the base line, release at your nose, come up, throw the racket like a tomahawk towards the fence, but low that forward as well. That's how you hit a slice serve, my name's Lincoln Ward, thank you very much."