{"id":197,"date":"2026-09-17T01:51:54","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T01:51:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/?p=197"},"modified":"2026-10-04T10:19:24","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T10:19:24","slug":"how-to-predict-the-speed-up-like-a-pro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/?p=197","title":{"rendered":"How to predict the speed up like a pro"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe title=\"How to predict the speed up like a pro #pickleball #pickleballtips\" width=\"563\" height=\"1000\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Ggj0AUF-pPM?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The Prince of Pickleball short is brief but complete: <strong>\u201cHold your ground when your opponent&#8217;s power face begins to close. Take the ball early when your opponent&#8217;s power face begins to open.\u201d<\/strong> That is the whole lesson \u2014 a paddle-face tell for predicting the speed-up.<\/p>\n<p>Closed power face \u2192 they are less likely to rip; hold your ground \/ stay ready. Opening power face \u2192 speed-up is coming; take it early. Use this in dink battles and hands exchanges where players telegraph with the face before the swing. Keep it simple: the power-face open\/close read is the point, so don\u2019t clutter it with extra tells.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Key takeaways:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Watch the opponent\u2019s power face in the kitchen<\/li>\n<li>Face closing \u2192 hold your ground<\/li>\n<li>Face opening \u2192 take the ball early<\/li>\n<li>Anticipate the speed-up before the swing finishes<\/li>\n<li>Keep the read simple: opening or closing face<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Action items:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Warm-up dinks: partner deliberately closes vs opens the face; you call \u201chold\u201d or \u201cearly\u201d before contact<\/li>\n<li>Hands drill: only counter when you correctly read an opening face<\/li>\n<li>Film opponent paddle face in a practice game; review one rally in slow-mo<\/li>\n<li>Partner telegraph drill: exaggerate open\/close for 5 minutes, then go subtle<\/li>\n<li>Live rule: if you flinch on a closed face, that speed-up attempt was bait \u2014 note it<\/li>\n<li>Next session: 10 minutes of read-only (call the face) before any counters allowed<\/li>\n<li>Combine with Richard Pickleball\u2019s bump defense (<a href=\"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/?p=173\">Handle the tough dinks!<\/a>) when the speed-up never comes and you\u2019re jammed<\/li>\n<li>Track false jumps (moving on closed faces) for one practice week<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"tdd-newsletter\">\n<p><strong>Get the 5 best pickleball tips every week<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/subscribe-forms.beehiiv.com\/v3\/loader.js\" data-beehiiv-form=\"0e5f3fe0-e4d3-4036-8d7f-c33b311980b2\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/thedropdrive.beehiiv.com\/subscribe\">Subscribe free<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Prince of Pickleball short is brief but complete: \u201cHold your ground when your opponent&#8217;s&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":728,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,3,200],"tags":[311,309,310,312,308],"class_list":["post-197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hands","category-kitchen","category-strategy","tag-ckleball","tag-kitchen-hands","tag-power-face","tag-priannctiec-iofp-atpei","tag-speed-up"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/02-kitchen-line-through-the-net-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=197"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":539,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197\/revisions\/539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedropdrive.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}