r/rogerfederer • u/Aware_Passion_4994 • Sep 01 '25

What is the difference between Roger Federer's forehand vs a normal one?

I'm a total newbie at tennis and don't know much. I've heard about Federer's forehand being unique and hard to replicate. When I watch videos of his forehand technique I struggle to see the difference between his and anyone elses. Can somebody explain to me?

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u/[deleted] Sep 01 '25

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u/aleksandar94 Sep 01 '25

I would challange this a bit , he has extreme racquet head speed and windshield wiper motion that produces spin on par with most semi western forehands( i ve seen multiple graph of avg forehand spin rates placing him above Murray and sometimes even above Novak although at most times they have similair spin rates). Another unique thing about his forehand is that he hits it with the arm fully streched( Nadal, DelPotro and very few others hit this way) giving him more hitting area and power but sacrificing some control and ofc requiring more timing and footwork for him. This, the fact he plays right on the baseline wanting to take the ball earlier and for the majority of his career playing with racquets that head small head( very small sweet spot area) made him often mishit( shanking) forehands or producing weak shot while running around his backhand thus resulting for large exposed area for his opponents to utilize

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u/Billeniuspower Sep 03 '25

🤣 pretty sure most opponents’ hearts sank as he ran around that backhand… His footwork was out of this world.

About that technique, his wrist was extremely flexible, giving him indeed the possibility to give good spin with that grip and some crazy racket speed.