Jack Sock Forehand Breakdown | Massive Spin & Power

Jack Sock had one of the most explosive forehands tennis I've ever seen. Not because it looked textbook but because it kind of broke the rules. Massive racket head speed, extreme whip, insane spin and enough power to dominate the best players in the world. In today's video we're going to break down how unbelievable Jack's forehand was and despite not having the best backhand in the world his serve and his forehand really dominated his game which made him a difficult opponent for any player. He really liked to set up on that forehand, hit really heavy with really fast racket head speed. He had a gift of an extremely quick arm that not many players had that sort of level of talent in their arm to swing the racket that quickly. So in today's video we're going to break down exactly how he did it. Let's do it. So Jack used to like to play a lot of open stance forehands or semi-open stance forehands. Here you can see as the ball comes in he's got a really fast preparation. So he's got a nice wide base and you can see how quickly he's going to rotate his shoulders and get his chest facing side on. So he gets to that position before the ball lands on his side of the court. So that's when the ball's landing and you can really see how he keeps that left hand on the throat of the racket and he doesn't prepare the racket very high. You can see he keeps it very close to his head but he keeps the tip of the racket under head high. So he's got a really compact swing and that was really efficient for him to play off on the baseline, take time away from his opponent and also not get rushed on this side. So you can see that he keeps that back elbow slightly raised there. You can see how it's slightly raised and it's got that almost a 90 degree bend in the elbow and what he really likes to do is load on that outside leg. So most of his forehands he likes to set up either semi-open or open and that gave him maximum leg drive in that stance and it really gave him great access to loading through his legs, getting that racket head moving quickly by unloading through that back hip. So now we're going to look at when the ball starts to rise up to Jack what the next move is and here he goes into that set position and he stretches that left arm out to the side and by doing that that's really helping him coil the shoulders and stretching those muscles through his core, loading through the core and the legs which helps get you that extra whip effect on your shots. So he almost has a little bit of a sinner effect. So he was probably one of the first players to almost in that era to start this new era of that sinner style forehand where you can see as he drops the racket down into that pat the dog position that a lot of coaches call it you can see that he's inverted the wrist. So the side of the racket that he hits the ball with you can see how the strings are pointing out to the side he's actually going to get those strings facing the back wall there. So the strings that's the side of the racket that he's actually going to hit the ball with. So he's tilt he's he's inverted the hand inwards showing the strings to the back wall. By doing that that gives you maximum racket acceleration and extra access to spin because it really gets the the strings facing down in the pat the dog position right. So then you can see the arms sort of in that position here so it's nice and relaxed in his forearm. So now as the ball's rising up to him that's when he's going to get into the racket lag phase right. So that's when the racket is naturally going to lag back behind him and to do this guys you've got to be super super relaxed in the wrist here in order for your hip to uncoil and the racket to lag back you've got to be relaxed in that hand. So you can see as that hip goes from being side on to facing forwards here you can see the hip is now face forward and the racket is naturally lagging behind the body there right and he's got a really good if I draw the angle through the wrist so you'll see all the best players in the world tend to achieve a pretty extreme racket lag on their forehand. Rafael Nadal has this position pretty locked in as well. That is the angle that you're trying to achieve if you want to maximize your racket head speed in the lag phase of the swing. So now we can see he's got a bent arm here as well and he's going to lead through to contact with that arm bent as well on contact and you can see his elbow is very close to his body on the swing whereas a lot of players with those straight arm forehand swing more out to the side and he's actually making contact closer to his body than a lot of players. A lot of coaches will say you don't want to make contact too close to your body, it's not a good position, it's not a strong position to be in and that is true but this is where Jack Sock was blessed with that really fast arm and a strong physique that allowed him to generate crazy racket head speed, hold that ball for the last second and then accelerate quite close to his body and not many players can do this. This is a really talented unique gift to him. So you can see that he's following through over the shoulder and the strings face off to the side and by opening the strings outwards that way that maximizes your spin and that vertical lift up and over the net whereas if you close the hand on the finish it's going to be a much more lower trajectory over the net. You can see that he likes to play open stance on a lot of these balls and there you go he just unleashes with such quick arm and that's just all in his forearm by being super loose and just having that whip effect. So let's have a little look from the side on view right so he starts in the racket in the ready position with the string slightly facing down in that position and the left hand on the throat of the racket. He also uses quite an extreme grip, he's got an extremely strong semi-western grip at the beginning of his swing and that maximizes your ability to get up and under the ball with a lot of topspin. So he takes that racket back notice how in this position the hand is behind his body it's not in line with his body so when you're taking the racket back make sure your right hand gets behind your right shoulder and not in line with your body that's really important to make sure you're prepared properly. The left hand is up on the racket and he's not taking that racket above his head height which I find quite interesting because that means it's really compact and very efficient. So now we're going to see into the racket drop and that's where you can see he inverts he gets the strings the side of the racket that he's hitting the ball with facing the back tip of the racket slightly out to the side as well that arm goes back a little bit here and the left arm reaches out to the side he's also loading through the legs there as well. So now he's going to drop down and this is when the racket lag phase happens and as he uncoils through the hips here so he uncoils this way the racket naturally lags back behind and then catches up and let's have a look at the contact point so he does strike it out in front but it's a little bit closer and there are a few similarities to his forehand and Yannick Sinner's forehand being the racket drop phase and also the contact point is fairly similar however Sinner quite often plays a little bit more in neutral stance closed stance whereas Jack was really dominating in that that's that semi-open open stance so hope you enjoyed this video guys it was good to have a look at this legendary Jacksock forehand as you know he's kind of one of the kind one of a kind player to have that extreme racket head speed on that side if you want your own game analyzed just check the link in my bio and we'll get you improving as quickly as possible thanks again thanks for watching and i'll see you on the next video Jack