Vlad escapades and the little treasures of archives at their best! ;D -- Knuckle balls are difficult to catch in soccer/association football also since their trajectory is quite chaotic and as such unpredictable. You just kick the ball with the knuckles of your foot and let the ball float. Not the easiest thing to do but practice makesyou a master - or at least proficient in producing the non-spinning ball with winning frequency. How does this all relate to tennis then? Maybe the most obvious link is junk balls you hit to get your opponent out of rhythm. As you can find on this channel Monfils executing such tactics against Nole in the US Open with a hilarious though not that lasting effect. Another association: Serve with no real pace nor spin - could it work - nope, you have to have at least spin or then it must be a perfect drop over the net. But hit/Kick/throw the knuckle and enjoy! (Toss a knuckle ball in your serve; it won't deviate in that low speed but is the most reliable toss!)
My brother taught me to not to hit the ball until I could see the spin. Sometimes when I do that I see, after the ball contacts the ground it has absolutely no spin. Mostly after a soft slice. It’s hard to hit sometimes. I’m relating that to a knuckle ball.
It started off as a question somewhat related to tennis when I asked how knuckleballs worked and if we could replicate them in tennis. Vlad's complete answer was: ++ PolKsio There is nothing mysterious about the knuckleballs. It all comes down to the same darn physics again - aerodynamics in this case. The baseball has seams. These seams protrude above the surface of the ball creating a ridge or a bump. These ridges or bumps create an “air drag” which affects the flight of the ball. If the ball is spinning, even moderately, the effects of that “air drag” will be negligible, since it will simply “average itself out”, but if you manage to throw the baseball so it would not spin at all - then the seams will remain in the same orientation throughout the whole flight of the ball. And they will create enough drag to have a noticeable effect on the ball’s flight. This force, small as it its, will start shifting that ball all over the place ever so slightly. And that small “vibration” is enough to unsettle the batter. You don’t need much to throw the batter off. See how much the aerodynamics can influence the ball’s flight. ruclips.net/video/D6v6lTSa8ks/видео.html You can not do the same thing to the tennis ball, but you can do exactly the same thing to your opponent, by doing the opposite to the ball - by spinning it! If you spin the ball heavily - the ball’s flight and its bounce becomes difficult to predict, ever-so-slightly. That becomes quite unsettling, since when it comes down to dealing with the ball in flight, we depend entirely (!) on the predictability of the ball’s trajectory. I would venture to suggest, that Borg’s and Nadal’s successes, are due, to a great extent, to their spinning of the ball so heavily. Their opponents constantly had to deal with the uncertainty, which their heavy spin brings to the table (Similarly to the uncertainty of the knuckleball’s no spin). That spin puts an addition burden on their opponents, which most of them simply are not prepared to deal with. This little factor is enough to demoralize probably 90% of all competition out there.
Vlad escapades and the little treasures of archives at their best! ;D -- Knuckle balls are difficult to catch in soccer/association football also since their trajectory is quite chaotic and as such unpredictable. You just kick the ball with the knuckles of your foot and let the ball float. Not the easiest thing to do but practice makesyou a master - or at least proficient in producing the non-spinning ball with winning frequency. How does this all relate to tennis then? Maybe the most obvious link is junk balls you hit to get your opponent out of rhythm. As you can find on this channel Monfils executing such tactics against Nole in the US Open with a hilarious though not that lasting effect. Another association: Serve with no real pace nor spin - could it work - nope, you have to have at least spin or then it must be a perfect drop over the net. But hit/Kick/throw the knuckle and enjoy! (Toss a knuckle ball in your serve; it won't deviate in that low speed but is the most reliable toss!)
My brother taught me to not to hit the ball until I could see the spin. Sometimes when I do that I see, after the ball contacts the ground it has absolutely no spin. Mostly after a soft slice. It’s hard to hit sometimes. I’m relating that to a knuckle ball.
I really enjoyed that interview!
++Rami Ruhayel
I also thought that it was quite insightful, informative and funny.
Johnny Carson had a true gift for making other people shine.
Carson was the best, RIP.
I like long videos on this channel, hope the next one will be more related to tennis:D
It started off as a question somewhat related to tennis when I asked how knuckleballs worked and if we could replicate them in tennis.
Vlad's complete answer was:
++ PolKsio
There is nothing mysterious about the knuckleballs. It all comes down to the same darn physics again - aerodynamics in this case.
The baseball has seams. These seams protrude above the surface of the ball creating a ridge or a bump. These ridges or bumps create an “air drag” which affects the flight of the ball.
If the ball is spinning, even moderately, the effects of that “air drag” will be negligible, since it will simply “average itself out”, but if you manage to throw the baseball so it would not spin at all - then the seams will remain in the same orientation throughout the whole flight of the ball. And they will create enough drag to have a noticeable effect on the ball’s flight.
This force, small as it its, will start shifting that ball all over the place ever so slightly. And that small “vibration” is enough to unsettle the batter. You don’t need much to throw the batter off.
See how much the aerodynamics can influence the ball’s flight.
ruclips.net/video/D6v6lTSa8ks/видео.html
You can not do the same thing to the tennis ball, but you can do exactly the same thing to your opponent, by doing the opposite to the ball - by spinning it! If you spin the ball heavily - the ball’s flight and its bounce becomes difficult to predict, ever-so-slightly.
That becomes quite unsettling, since when it comes down to dealing with the ball in flight, we depend entirely (!) on the predictability of the ball’s trajectory.
I would venture to suggest, that Borg’s and Nadal’s successes, are due, to a great extent, to their spinning of the ball so heavily. Their opponents constantly had to deal with the uncertainty, which their heavy spin brings to the table (Similarly to the uncertainty of the knuckleball’s no spin).
That spin puts an addition burden on their opponents, which most of them simply are not prepared to deal with. This little factor is enough to demoralize probably 90% of all competition out there.
Very Related : No Spin