Question: What the Heck is "Hitting the Ball on the Rise?"

Hitting the ball on the rise is a term that was made popular by Andre Agassi who did this EXTREMELY WELL.

"On the rise" sometimes referred to as "taking it early" is pretty literal.  The ball is rising from the ground and you hit it before is starts to fall back to the ground.

This is Jo Wilfried hitting balls on the rise in slow motion.  Notice how the ball itself is still rising when he strikes the ball:


And here is the OPPOSITE in Tommy Robredo in which the ball is descending to the ground when he hits it:


Compairing the two, notice that Tsonga is almost on top of the baseline where Robredo is so far back you don't know where the baseline is.  This builds into the tactics of the two contrasting styles.

People that hit the ball "on the rise" (like Tsonga) like to use foot speed and timing to speed up the points and make their opponent feel rushed.  The idea is that the opponent gets tired trying to keep up with your aiming and your agility.  These players use more quick twitch muscles for shorter points.


Here are two players with the "on the rise" Philosophy featuring Andre Agassi and Roger Federer


People that hit the ball normally like to wait on the ball and load into it with a perfect well taught stroke.  The idea is that the ball is such a high quality spinning ball that the opponent will have to back up to deal with the balls that explode off the ground and throw off an aggressive players timing.  These players use long twitch muscles for longer, more organized points.

Two players with the "on the decline" philosophy.  Gael Monfils and Rafael Nadal


It is important to note that these two tactics are just a philosophy.  You can be any type pf player (serve volley excluded) and subscribe to any one of these at any time.  For instance: Federer and Murray are both the tennis genius style of all court player with a huge arsenal of shots at their disposal.  But Federer plays fast and Murray doesn't.  Murray can decide to play fast if he needs to change his tactics to win (that is what makes him a genius).

Also important is noting that a player doesn't ALWAYS hit on the rise.  It just means they stand close to the baseline during rallies which ups the chance of them hitting on the rise balls.

Hitting the ball "on the rise" is a term for hitting the ball as early as you can after the bounce.  But it is also a tactic in which you take time away from your opponents and test their ability to deal with your urgency.  So run circles around those cones, jump rope and play some "whack-a-mole" because you are going to need to recognize and react to a lot of balls very casually.