Racquetball Tips – Getting The Right Grip

Racquetball as a healthy indoor sport is getting to be popular once again, this time the number of enthusiasts growing slowly but steadily. Gym courts are now filled up and tournaments, clubs and leagues are sprouting once more.

For beginners and those virtual greenhorns to the game who want to improve their games, here are some tips on some very important basics on racquetball. One of these is the all-important way of getting a grip on your racquet handle.

Finger formation

Without the right knowledge on the proper and consistent grip of your racquet, you will remain clueless to the real feel of what a racquet is. The end result can be serious control problems in the future.

For beginners, this can be a source of great frustration that can drive one away from the game altogether.

An important point is having the proper grip size on your racquet – a ¼ inch or so of space between fingers and palm. This happens quite often to women who are sold racquets with grips too large for their hands.

Handshake formation

Your grip on your racquet should begin with a V formation of your thumb and forefinger. Make it so like you are going to do a handshake, only this time you are going to do it with your racquet.

Most often, beginners hold their rackets like they are holding a baseball bat or a club. The wrong way of holding it is to create a round hand shape (the tips of the forefinger and the thumb meet) around the handle instead of the “V” formation of the thumb and forefinger.

Clock formations

From your perspective, the forehand stance would look like a one o’clock position while the backhand would look like an eleven o’clock position.

Here is a little demonstration.

Hold the racket like you are shaking hands with somebody, only that you are holding the handle of your racquet. Looking straight at your thumb you will see that together with your forefinger, they form a “V”.

Again, for demonstration purposes treat your thumb as the 12 o’clock position. The forefinger is at 1 o’clock position in the forehand perspective.

In the backhand perspective, your thumb is still at the 12 o’clock position. This time, however, your forefinger is now in the 11 o’clock position.

The swings

From this backhand perspective, you can swing your racquet in a regular motion. The grip should make it so that the racquet face is parallel with the sidewall of the court.

If you will not change the swing from forehand to backhand, the racquet face will be slightly tilted backwards and hit the ball with an under-spin, just like in tennis. (You will have to torque your wrist if you want to hit the ball flat.)

Another grip to head off potential problems would be placing your forefinger up the grip pointing towards the racquet face on the forehand stroke, inhibiting a wrist snap.

On the backhand stroke, place your thumb on the handle as though you are pushing an imaginary button. This will hold back again proper wrist snap and causing a pushing stroke.

Racquetball is not rocket science, as the cliché goes. However, just like any other sport, you need to practice and play to perfect your winning moves.