Speed Volley

Brian Baker's backhand volley

The second of Jeff Cooper's tennis drills is for volleys. Players must work their way through four levels of volley difficulty by hitting successfully 7 of 8 feeds alternating forehand and backhand volleys. First round feeds are the slowest and become successively faster as player advances. Jeff suggests a timing interval of 4 seconds between feeds in the first round, then 2 seconds in second round; 1 second in third, and half a second in the last and most difficult round.

Already I am thinking it will be tough to feed at such a consistently specific rate per round per student, but my students really enjoyed the Tornado volley drill so I will give this one a try as well. I'll let you know how it goes.

UPDATE: My fears about consistent feed rates were unfounded, mainly because I reduced it from four to three rounds: slow, medium, and Lightning. This has turned into a great volley instruction tool. When the students see how difficult it is to perform at Lightning round pace properly, they are ready to listen to some tips on proper volley and recovery technique.