Coaching Pronation in Tennis and Badminton

As well as being a big sports fan, I am also a qualified coach in tennis and badminton. From time to time I will probably post about some of the techniques associated with these sports - here's the first one!

Forearm pronation is one of the most important techniques to master in racket sports (particularly badminton), but is also one of the most difficult to teach successfully.

Pronation is a term and an action which can often go unnoticed even by players who participate at a relatively high level. My experience as a coach is that the majority of people struggle to understand the concept, and even those who perform the technique well are often unaware that they are doing so.

Pronation

If you hold out your hands in front of your body with your elbows held close to your side, pronation of the forearm is the action required to turn your palms from facing upwards to facing downwards. In badminton, this action is vital for overhead shots requiring any sort of power (clears and smashes), as it uses the larger forearm muscles rather than relying on simple wrist flexion.

Incorporating pronation into the overall overhead action involves quite a complex set of movements, which is probably why it is such a tricky skill to coach to someone who has never done it before. In short, it requires a throwing action with the racket, which involves the elbow moving towards the shuttle/ball first, ahead of the racket, before using pronation to swing the racket through the shot.

The easiest way that I have found to coach this movement is by getting the pupil's arm to start in the position shown here, with the elbow forward. This way they have to pronate in order to get a good contact with the shuttle. Most people eventually get the hang of this, but still find it difficult to make the transition to a full swing of the racket including pronation.

Beginners often start with a panhandle grip and use only wrist flexion to get power. This seems to make logical sense as it keeps the strings facing in the direction we want the shuttle to travel throughout the entirety of the stroke. When using pronation, the strings actually only face in the intended direction of the shot for the split second that they are in contact with the shuttle. Before contact they face 'inwards' and after contact they face 'outwards'. It is only when we slow down the technique of a powerful player that we can see just how much pronation they are using to generate such speed:

The position the Pete Sampras is in here just after contacting a serve looks completely unnatural, yet it is a crucial component of how he was able to generate so much power. I think that this unfamiliarity and the perceived strangeness of the movements required to pronate are a large part of what makes it so hard to coach, at least to players who are used to hitting the ball/shuttle an entirely different and less effective way. The same goes for the supination required for backhand overheads.


Anyway, those are just a few thoughts and tips about pronation. If anyone has developed any interesting or new ways to teach these techniques feel free to get in touch, I'd love to hear them!

Wallwork follows Bankier in Badminton England exit

Yesterday Badminton England suffered yet another loss to their performance squad, as Jenny Wallwork announced her resignation from the GB Badminton Programme. Wallwork was the highest ranked and most promising female player remaining on the training programme at the National Badminton Centre in Milton Keynes. She came out with an emotional and strongly worded message against the Performance Director Jens Grill (pictured right) on Twitter (http://www.twitlonger.com/show/l56oca), explaining how she was given no opportunity to have any input into the direction of her playing career.

It seems that the Performance Directors at Badminton England are intent on imposing a strict regime, and are telling athletes that if they do not comply then they can leave. The problem is that two of the best players in Great Britain have now opted for the latter. Scot Imogen Bankier made a similar decision to Wallwork following the London 2012 Olympics, stating that there was no consultation with the players themselves about future plans in the build up to Rio 2016. When told that she needed to be in Milton Keynes for 6 days a week despite only training with mixed doubles partner Chris Adcock on 3 of those days, Bankier, whose home and personal support network were in Glasgow, decided that enough was enough.

Bankier could, however, take some solace from the fact that she could return to Scotland and continue playing. Wallwork has nowhere else to go, and by resigning from the GB Performance Programme is in effect retiring from badminton. Grill said today that the door is still open for her to return despite her scathing public outburst. Perhaps this is a sign of how important a player she is in the current squad of players, and a last ditch attempt to convince her to stay.

Overall, this sequence of events seems to suggest very poor management at the top level of badminton in England. As Doug Gillon wrote for Herald Scotland following Bankier's departure from the GB setup, "managing sometimes maverick talent is what performance directors are supposed to do, not batter it into a template." There has been widespread support for Wallwork following her decision yesterday, including Olympic rower Matthew Pinsent who congratulated her on Twitter for doing the right thing. One wonders how many other players within the GB Performance Programme will find their voices having seen the respect one of their team mates has received for speaking out.

Badminton England have reaffirmed their confidence in the current programme with a focus on young players coming through and building for the future. But in doing this are they abandoning all hope of seeing success with the current talent available? Adcock and Bankier reached the final of the 2012 World Championships. It appears unlikely that Adcock can repeat those kinds of results having restarted his partnership with girlfriend Gabby White - they failed to even reach the final of the English National Championships earlier this month. Mixed doubles has always been England and Great Britain's strongest discipline, but it could now be some time before we see anything like the achievements of Robertson and Emms or Adcock and Bankier. I hope I am proved wrong.

Pistorius - The fall of the sporting hero

Just 6 days ago, Oscar Pistorius tweeted "1 month till my first race of 2013.. Can't wait to burn it up!". What happened in the days that followed was incredible, shocking and unbelievable. As different media sources from all over the world continue to fuel the fire with alleged cricket bats, steroids, drinking problems and phone calls to either condemn or support the 'blade runner', I couldn't help but think about the fall from grace of sporting heroes.

Sportsmen and women have been highly respected role models for a long time. There is something about an honest, true, successful athlete that appears to us somehow correct and reflective of how we should all strive to behave. The great sportspeople are committed, brave and ruthless in action, but gracious in victory and defeat. 

Such is the way that people are drawn to these attributes, it seems that some disgraced athletes can earn forgiveness relatively easily. Tiger Woods has made an extraordinary comeback in terms of his popularity following the issues he had in his private life, and was mainly supported by golf fans despite admitting to an extra-marital affair. It seems that saying sorry can make a big difference on the road to recovery, as was also proved by Marion Jones.


Other athletes have not managed to regain the respect of the people. Lance Armstrong is porbably the best example of this to date (except perhaps OJ Simpson) - it seems unthinkable that Armstrong will ever be looked upon favourably again after his enormous lies and deceit. And if the people no longer look up to the athlete, you can guarantee that the sponsors will be out of there as quickly as possible. Armstrong reportedly lost $75 million in sponsorships in just one day following the doping scandal as partners rushed to dissociate themselves with the cyclist.

And so we wait to see which category Pistorius will fall into. Forgiven or condemned? If convicted the answer is straightforward. But if he is cleared, will the public see this as enough to continue viewing him as a role model, someone to amaze and inspire? Or will his reputation remain tarnished forever even if this tragedy was a simple freak accident? These days the title 'sporting hero' is a very fragile one to bear.

Wrestling out, Modern Pentathlon still in?

Major news today in Summer Olympic sport - wrestling has been pushed out of the 2020 Olympic Games.

The reaction to this decision, made by the IOC in Lausanne earlier today, has been of widespread shock. Most expected either modern pentathlon or taekwondo to get the chop, and amateur wrestling's world governing body described the decision as "an aberration". So why is everyone so surprised?

Wrestling can be a spectacular sport

Well, wrestling is one of the few remaining (until today) sports that was contested in the ancient Olympic Games held in Greece from 776 BC to about 394 AD. In this respect wrestling, along with events like running, boxing and equestrian, is a truly traditional Olympic sport. It was present at the inaugural modern Olympics in 1896 and since then has been an event at every Olympic meeting except Paris in 1900.

Easy to see why there has been such uproar, then, when we consider that among the sports hoping to fill the gap left by wrestling are 'roller sports' and 'sport climbing', both of which will be completely unfamiliar even to moderately avid sports fans.

But some would say that every sport deserves a chance at the Olympics to show the world what it's about and what makes it great. I agree with this - badminton is my favourite sport to play, and the number of people who think of it as a casual game played on a grass lawn in the back garden on a summer's day irritates me. The Olympics offers sports a brief opportunity to show how their game can be played at the highest level - incidentally something that badminton drastically failed to do in London 2012.

So I would welcome any new sport to the Olympics with open arms. It is some of the events which have been in the programme and remain there which bother me. Take the modern pentathlon, which comprises of shooting, fencing, swimming, show-jumping and cross country running. The idea behind this event is that it showcases all the skills and attributes required for a 19th century cavalry soldier to prosper behind enemy lines. The problem is that all of the events within the sport are also currently present in another Olympic sport (although not specifically pistol shooting). Whilst this is also the case for the events of the heptathlon or the decathlon, both these events occur within the sport of Athletics. So the modern pentathlon, as far as I can see, is 'taking up' a space which has already been filled.

Give every sport a go, let's see if there are some hidden gems out there that deserve to be Olympic events. But if they don't, move them aside to make room for something else.

Hello!

Hi everyone!

I'm Mike, a recent graduate from Durham University now living in Bucks, UK.

I've always had a great passion for sport, and I love reading about all the latest news, gossip and media hype. There's always something going on in the sporting world, so I thought - why don't I write about it? On here I'll offer my views on news from various sports, and how the big stories are being portrayed by the media.

So hello again, and I hope you enjoy it!

Mike