Racquetball Fundamentals - Jim Winterton

Racquetball Fundamentals

by Jim Winterton

NEW, 152 pages

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About Racquetball Fundamentals

Head to the court and learn to hit that winning kill shot in no time at all! Racquetball Fundamentals will have you playing and competing while you master the basics of the game.

You’ll learn shot techniques for the forehand, backhand, serve, return of serve, passing shot, side-wall shot, and kill shot. You will also become more competitive with instruction on shot selection, court positioning, and footwork. Soon you’ll be winning your share of matches as you employ those techniques with the tactics taught for both singles and doubles play.

More than 75 drills and games will speed your learning and improve your performance. You’ll also gain a greater understanding of the game’s rules, scoring, etiquette, and safety.

Racquetball Fundamentals is a better way to learn the basics in less time. Use it now and get a step—and point—ahead of your next opponent.

About Fran Davis

With more than 30 years of experience coaching athletes from the beginner to the elite levels, Jim Winterton is recognized as one of the best racquetball coaches in the world. He is director of the High Performance Racquetball Camp in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and has coached the U.S. national team for 12 years. During this time he has led his teams to five Tournaments of the Americas team crowns (1992, 1994, 1996, 1998, and 2002) and three first-place standings in the Pan American Games (1995, 1999, and 2003). Winterton also served a brief term as coach of the U.S. junior national team before accepting the position of head coach of the Mexican national team from 1999 to 2001.

He has been named Racquetball Coach of the Year by the United States Olympic Committee three times (1995, 1999, and 2003) and was a Racquetball Hall Of Fame inductee in 1999. Winterton is coaching clinician for the International Professional Racquetball Organization and is a certifying instructor for the American Professional Racquetball Organization. He also runs a racquetball program at Gold's Gym in Syracuse, New York. His coaching philosophy is simple: Practice makes perfect is not true; perfect practice makes perfect is true.

Winterton resides in Liverpool, New York.

About Racquetball

Racquetball is a racquet sport played with a hollow rubber ball in an indoor or outdoor court. Joe Sobek is credited with inventing racquetball in 1950, adding a stringed racquet to paddleball in order to increase velocity and control. Unlike most racquet sports, such as tennis and badminton, there is no net to hit the ball over, and unlike squash no tin (out of bounds area at the bottom of front wall) to hit the ball above. Also, the court's walls, floor, and ceiling are legal playing surfaces, with the exception of court-specific designated hinders being out-of-bounds.

The primary strategy of racquetball is to command the center of the court just at or behind the dashed receiving line. This allows the player to move as quickly as possible to all areas of the court and limit open court areas which are difficult to defend. After a shot, return quickly to center court. The antithesis of this is to be against a wall which severely limits the player's movement and allows the opponent an open court.

Keep an eye on the opponent by glancing sideways to anticipate his return shot and move appropriately in the court. Learn the typical return shots of the opponent and move appropriately in the court for a return shot. Attempt to not be predictable with your return shots.

Other more obvious strategies are to keep the returned ball as low on the front wall as possible, keeping the ball moving fast (limiting reaction time) and to keep your opponent moving away from center court by the use of lobs, cross court shots, and dinks.

Play begins with the serve. The serving player must bounce the ball on the floor once and hit it directly to the front wall, making the ball hit the floor beyond the short line; otherwise the serve counts as a fault. The ball may touch one side wall, but not two, prior to hitting the floor; hitting both side walls after the front wall (but before the floor) is a "three wall serve," and a fault. Also, serving the ball into the front wall so that it rebounds to the back wall without hitting the floor first is a long serve, and a fault.

Other fault serves include a ceiling serve in which the ball touches the ceiling after the front wall and serving before the receiving player is ready. Also, the server must wait until the ball passes the short line before stepping out of the service box, otherwise it is a fault serve.

If the server hits the ball directly to any surface other than the front wall the server immediately loses serve regardless of whether it was first or second serve.

After the ball bounces behind the short line, or passes the receiving line, the ball is in play and the opposing player(s) may play it.

Usually, the server is allowed two opportunities (called first serve and second serve) to put the ball into play (two serve rule), although elite level competitions often allow the server only one opportunity (one serve rule).

After a successful serve, players alternate hitting the ball against the front wall. The player returning the hit may allow the ball to bounce once on the floor or hit the ball on the fly. However, once the player returning the shot has hit the ball, either before bouncing on the floor or after one bounce, it must strike the front wall before it hits the floor. Unlike during the serve, a ball in play may touch as many walls, including the ceiling, as necessary so long as it reaches the front wall without striking the floor.

Racquetball Fundamentals