Cognitive and motor Analysis of the Tennis Serve Return Expertise under Virtual Environment

Abstract

In tennis performance analysis, it is important to understand differences between advanced and beginners in order to train beginners in an efficient manner. To understand these differences within the game of tennis, we developed a virtual environment to analyze the responses of advanced and beginners to services. By capturing actual service motions of an expert, it is possible to reproduce virtualized services in the environment and we can make special services by combining ball motion and server motion in addition to usual services. We did two experiments on types of services, cognitive and motor analysis. As a result of motor analysis, there is a difference in the initial response of take-back between the top group of advanced and the other groups. In cognitive analysis, we found a difference between advanced and beginners in anticipation skill. We consider the more skilled players are, the more important the anticipation when playing become.