What is SSV?

• It's a basic skills drill.
• It's a game
• It’s an evaluation
• Its a rating.

What is SSV compared to?

• A national junior competition like:
  • Football’s Punt, Pass & Kick
  • Baseball’s Pitch, Hit & Run
  • Golf’s Drive, Chip & Putt
• Is that all?
  • No, its more.
  • Its an objective method of measuring tennis ability.

Why use SSV?

• To find out how good you are.
• To measure your improvement.
• To place you in the right game.
• To introduce you to the game.

Why was SSV developed?

• Golfer’s know how good they are.
• Bowler’s know how good they are.
• The score in tennis doesn’t tell you.
  • Only a winner and a loser.
• SSV allows you to play against the game itself.
• A score in SSV tells you how good you are.
• Like golf and bowling, it's an objective format.

How does it work?

• Players hit balls to target areas with different strokes.
• Points are scored for control and power.
• Control is the first bounce.
• Power is the second bounce.
  • The combined total points for control and power is the SSV score.

How is the ball put into play?

• A ball is fed with an underarm ball toss.
• It is the best way for different people to deliver the same ball.
• It does not intimidate a beginner.
• It requires good stroke production to generate power.

What about bad ball tosses?

• The player can reject any ball.

Why score control?

• Better players have better control.

Why score power?

• In many sports like tennis, better players have both more control and power.
• In golf, control is direction and power is distance.
• In SSV control is hitting a target area and power is the depth of the second bounce.
• The credibility of SSV is due to scoring both control and power.

Why the second bounce?

• Speed could indicate power.
• Impact could indicate power.
• These are too complicated to measure effectively.
• A ball hit hard has a deeper second bounce than a soft ball.

Doesn’t a topspin lob have a deep second bounce?

• Yes, and it scores high in SSV.
• A topspin lob is an effective shot.
• It takes a good player to consistently hit topspin lobs.
• Better players score higher even when they use topspin lobs.
• Deep second bounce is an accurate description of the power score.
• Power sounds better than deep second bounce.

Why don’t you measure other skills, like reflex, endurance, strategy, etc.?

• Those are important skills. However, they don’t become a
  factor in tennis unless both players’ basic skills of control and power are equal.
• For example, an out of shape experienced player with good
  control and power can easily beat a track star, karate expert or
  marathon swimmer if those athletics can’t keep the ball in play.

Why don’t you score the lob, drop shot or return of serve?

• Those are also important strokes. However, time is limited and
  those strokes are not a factor unless the basic skills are close.
• The objective is a simple fast method to measure skill.

How long does SSV take?

• Player hit 40 balls. It takes 5-8 minutes per player.

How do you know SSV works?

• Thousands of players have used SSV with excellent response from the
  players and teaching pros.
• Tournaments have been run using the SSV score to seed the draw.
• Over 80% of the matches were won by the player with the highest SSV.

How do you stop players from sandbagging?

• Good question. You can’t.
• Remove the incentive.
• Have round robin or league formats where everyone plays the same amount of tennis.
• Allow high SSV players to play down.
• Don’t allow low SSV players to play up.
• Lesser players like playing stronger players as long as
  they don’t get eliminated from the event like in traditional tournaments.
• The stronger players will want to play at their own level.
• With SSV as a minimum requirement for a level, the stronger
  players will make sure they score well on SSV.

How does SSV help the teaching pro?

• SSV is objective.
• The pro does not get negative feed back from a player
  or parent when they asked “How good am I doing?”.
• With the SSV score as the answer, the pro has a positive
  role in helping the player improve his or her skills.
• Players will see their improvement in higher SSV scores.
• Players will have more fun because they will be in the right game.
• The pro will see an increase in lessons.
• The pro will see an increase in program participation.

What is the SSV Tennis Website (www.ssvtennis.com)?

• It’s a place to get information about SSV.
• It’s a national database.
• Pros can register their players.
• Players can see their own national SSV rankings by age division.
• Pros and players can see national averages by age division.
• SSV events and results will be posted.