The common goal in pickleball is to neutralize the point, get to the NVZ, hold your ground, and win the point.
Surprising your opponents and watching them scramble is all part of the fun. There are many ways to do this at the NVZ, but here are my three favorite:
- Change Direction on the Dink – Get your opponents engaged in a crosscourt dink-a-thon. Watch them try to cover the three holes at the NVZ while you move them around. When the ball is placed towards your outside foot, keep your paddle and body looking like you are going to dink cross court and then at the last minute, change directions to go down the line by altering the path and angle of the paddle toward your target with a subtle adjustment of your wrist and arm. Bam! You have surprised your opponent and taken away their time by hitting down the line. This will often result in a winner or set your next shot to be a winner.
- Disguise A Speed Up – Dinking requires little to no backswing, so get into a dinking rhythm by moving your opponents around and then surprise them with a disguised speed up. Using the same body and paddle preparation, just change the paddle’s speed by flicking the wrist for a zinger. By the time your opponents realize what you are doing, it will be too late! Remember to generally dink cross court and speed up down the line (in front of you) to take away your opponent’s time.
- Lob – Nothing better than having four players sucked into a dink rally with all their weight forward and then surprising them by lobbing over their heads. Using the similar preparation for a dink, when executing, open the face of the paddle, and just extend the paddle pathway up and over the shorter or slower player’s head. Your opponents will be stuck admiring your beautiful lob like they would a luxury jetliner in the sky.
Slate’s Adult Group Instructional program will help you learn and develop these tactics and techniques using our STAGE methodology, which includes a tactics-first approach for skill development, eventually applying in cooperative and competitive live play situations, while the Practice and Play Program will set these situations up for you to practice during both dead and live ball play.
Can’t wait to give these a try? Download the Slate Pickleball App from Google Play or the Apple App Store, sign up for the free Stage 1 membership, and enroll for programming with ease!
We are opening our outdoor court September 30! See you out there.
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