Jump Serve

Last week a 4^th grader emailed me and asked if I could answer a few questions for her project on jump serving. I thought it was really cool that she chose that as her topic, and I was so happy to help. This is what I sent back to her, answering her questions and giving her some advice for her future volleyball career.

I think it's awesome that you are doing your project on jump serving. Here are my answers to your questions :)

1. There are 2 different kind of jump serves, the jump float and the jump top spin. I will explain how to do both.

Jump Float:

This is the serve that I use in games. It is really effective, but it takes a lot of practice. The most important thing about this serve is your contact. You want to contact the ball with a strong hand and solid wrist. You want to make sure you contact the ball with mostly just your palm so you can get it to float. You don't want to follow through on this serve, you want to stop your hand once you contact the ball. This serve is meant to make the ball move or float back and forth, so the other teams’ defenders have a hard time passing it. It is tricky to get this serve right away, it takes a lot of reps. So right now, since you are so young if you just practice the toss, footwork and jump you can worry about getting the ball to float once you have the other stuff down. It is awesome that you are thinking about jump serving right now. I don't think I started to jump serve until 8th grade!

Jump Top spin:

This serve requires a toss that is out in front of you so you can have a big approach and attack the ball. People who use this serve usually toss it with the same hand that they are going to be serving it with. While tossing you want to have some spin on the ball that will carry over into the serve. You want to contact the ball high and follow through with your arm, creating a spin on the ball. This one takes a lot of practice and I still haven't perfected it yet. 

2. The steps to do a jump serve are just like doing your approach for attacking. If you are right handed its left, right, left. If you are left handed its right, left, right.

3. In practice to get better and more consistent with my jump serve I focus on my technique and take my time on each serve.

4. For a jump top spin you should throw the ball pretty high so you have time to do your approach and still contact the ball high. For a float you will toss it lower because you are not jumping as high. I will attach some videos of each serve so you can see what the tosses are like.

5. If you step over the service line before you contact the ball then the other team gets the point. When you are jump serving you can jump over the line and contact the ball as long as you don't land before contact. 

6. Some advice for you would be never give up. I had a dream of playing Division 1 volleyball since I was your age and I never gave up and the hard worked paid off. I just recently committed to Loyola University in Chicago to play volleyball. Just always believe in yourself and keep working hard. Play whenever you can, even if it's just passing or setting the ball against your house, if it's ok with your parents :) Just getting extra touches on the ball will improve your skills.

Hope this helps and good luck with your project!

Word Count: 650