Why It's Almost Impossible to Hit a 160 MPH Tennis Serve | WIRED

Some of the best tennis players have incredibly fast serve speeds. The fastest official serve is 157 MPH, but could it be even faster? WIRED's Robbie Gonzalez looks into the science and skill of sizzling serves.


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Why It's Almost Impossible to Hit a 160 MPH Tennis Serve | WIRED

[VisualDrone]

- What's wrong with my serve?
- It's technique.

The polite way to say: "everything my dude".

[lifereflector]

The pros make tennis look so easy and simple but underneath that simplicity lies years of grueling practice, precision, coordination and skills. I love tennis

[speedstacker]

“Why can’t I serve more than 77 mph”

“Because you’re serving with a forehand grip”

[ShainAndrews]

When a professional says your technique is your hindering factor it is really code for "everything"

[Libegone]

I'm surprised no one told you how atrocious your grip on the raquet was.

[GetOutsideYourself]

Seeing that in super-slo-mo makes it look like a miracle of coordination.

[MarvinElsen]

257, 5 km/h or 71, 5 m/s for everyone else

[DistortedV]

I can see a parody of this: "Why It's Almost Impossible to Run 200 mph | WIRED"

[MrPoem-rqpz]

Thanks! I always wondered why I got 159MPH! Appreciate it man!

[boundertube]

So the reason we won't see 160mph is because it is hard to do - great.. I was assuming there was some Physics calculation based on terminal velocity or something..

[lh]

If they hadn't reduced the pressure in the balls twice since 1990, serves would be going over 160mph.

[klieu]

Nick Kyrgios underhand serve is better

[rohitcsrini]

Professional Tennis is the hardest sport in the world in my opinion. It’s individual with no coaching allowed on the men’s side. You need extreme physical fitness for long matches, or short matches with intense points. You have to have skill like in golf but with your racquet. And you also have to have extreme mental toughness and intelligence to play different types of opponents. And you have to do this year round Internationally in different time zones on different surfaces.

[johnhippisley]

Next: Why It’s Almost Impossible to Beat Your Meat 15x In a Row | WIRED

[MrBen]

Vice: 'It's almost impossible to hit a 160 mph serve'

Sam Groth: 'Get outta town mate'

[jpjmk]

I played against Reilly a couple times in Florida when we were 16, and his serve was by far the most consistently devastating I ever played against. Seeing him wreck tour players (like the Stan) with that serve now makes me feel a bit better lol...His height certainly helps but more so did his hitting a thousand plus serves every day... Repetition gets aces!

[BenTan]

Simply by using the correct grip - continental, you'd have increased your serve speed by an easy 10mph and more importantly consistency by triple fold.

[BenTan]

160mph almost impossible?

Sam Groth says: hold my bevvie.

[pequodexpress]

He could have added at least 3 MPH just by improving his grip lower down on the racket to increase leverage among other things.

[AverytheCubanAmerican]

Wii Sports tennis is the most epic and intense tennis