The 3-Target Serve Drill
The 3-Target Serve Drill
The drill that turns your most-wasted shot into free points.
By Sam Morris · 2026-06-16 · 10 minutes, solo
What it builds
- Primary skill: A consistent, repeatable serve you can place on demand
- Secondary skill: Deception — a serve that looks identical no matter where it lands
- Best for: DUPR 3.0–4.5 (and honestly, every level skips serve practice)
- Solo or partner: Solo. All you need is an empty court.
- Time commitment: 10–20 minutes, once or twice a week
Why this drill
The serve is the only shot you fully control — nobody's doing anything to you yet — and it's the one almost nobody practices. Watch rec play and you'll see the same lazy serve to the same middle spot, telegraphed by a different stance every time the player tries to "aim." The Dink wrote up a 3-target version this week that fixes both problems at once: consistency and deception, in the same ten minutes. Returners read your serve off your body, not the ball — so if your wide serve comes with a bigger windup, good opponents are leaning before you make contact.
Setup
You need almost nothing — that's the point. No partner, no excuse to skip it.
- A bucket or pocket of balls (15–20)
- Three cones (or water bottles, or a towel — anything you can aim at)
- An empty court — any quiet MoCo court works; early mornings at Bauer Drive are perfect
Place one cone in the middle, one at the T (near the centerline), and one wide (near the sideline), all deep in the service box.
The drill
- Lock in one serve routine — and never change it. Same five steps every ball: bounce, paddle by the hip, rock back, swing over the shoulder, head still. Boring is the goal; boring is what makes it repeatable under pressure.
- Rotate targets every ball. Middle, then T, then wide, then back to middle. Change where you're aiming — never how you set up.
- Same body, different result. Your stance, toss, and windup should look identical for all three. If you have to reach or re-square to hit wide, shrink the change until you don't.
- Reps: 5 clean serves at each target before you rotate out. Miss the box? That rep doesn't count.
Coach's tweak
Most players practice serve power. Skip that — practice serve sameness. Film yourself for 30 seconds from behind the baseline and watch only your setup across all three targets. If you can tell where the ball is going before you hit it, so can your opponent. A deep, deceptive serve you can repeat puts them on their back foot before the rally starts — worth more than 5 extra mph any day.
Try it live
→ Solo at any empty court — find one on the MoCo courts map → Pot Night signup — bring your new serve and test it under real pressure → Tag @linkanddink when you run this drill — we repost the best clips
This is part of the Drill of the Week series — one drill, every week, that you can actually run before your next game. See all drills · Subscribe.
Tags: drill-of-the-week, serve, solo, deception, consistency