Volleyball Tipping
6 Attack Strategies Outside Hitters Use To Score

The hard volleyball hit is not the only point scoring option a hitter has. Volleyball tipping is an offensive strategy you can use to vary your attack hits.

Volleyball Tipping: Be sure to mix up your shots as an attacker. Here are six ways you can use the tip as your offensive weapon. (Ralph Arvesen)

About volleyball tipping.

Be sure to include "the tip" as one of your options to your volleyball hit strategy to use in order to  mix up and vary your attack hits against opposing teams. 

Volleyball tipping. You want to be unpredictable as a hitter. And if your spike attacks are always hard hits, then that's very predictable. (Ralph Arvesen)

In your spike training drills, you want to know and you want to practice all the possible things you will do, if and when you get the perfect set.

Of course, when you get a perfect set you are going to want to hit the ball. But, that is also what the defense is expecting you to do.

To mix up your game, in practice, when your setter sets you the perfect ball to hit, don't! 

Tip it instead.

Volleyball Tipping Strategy: Catch the defense back on their heels because they expected you to hit hard and instead you tipped it softly over their block, short in their court. (Michael E. Johnston)

If you do, you will catch the defense back on their heels because they expected you to hit that ball hard and instead you fooled them and tipped it softly over their block, short in their court.

Now they have to scramble to pick a ball up that they didn't expect to get.

In the book “The Art of War’ Sun Tzu says “Make your enemy prepare on his left and then attack on his right.”

This means you must be flexible. You must be prepared to do what your enemy does not expect you to do.

Smart hitters look for volleyball tipping opportunities to outsmart the opposing team's defense. After you've hit a few balls hard on the next good set tip the ball to an open space. (Gallery Three)

This is what smart hitters do.

They look for opportunities to outsmart the opposing team's defense.

After you've hit several balls hard against their block, on the next good set your setter gives you, you should tip the ball to an open space on the opposing team's court, they will never expect it.

A good strategy to adopt is for every 5 or 6 balls that you hit you may want to try a tip on the next good set that you get.

Sure I know that you use the tip to save a broken play because many times, at the last minute, that's the only thing you think you can do to keep the ball in play.

But the question is still, how are you going to use the tip to save a broken play?

This suggestion may sound risky but like all things once you get used to doing it in practice then it will become a habit.

Once things become a habit, then we aren't so afraid of trying them when we have to, like in a game situation.

One way a player like yourself, can save a broken play is to soft tip the ball into the block on purpose.

Sure I know that you use the tip to save a broken play because many times, at the last minute, that's the only thing you think you can do to keep the ball in play. (Michael E Johnston photo)

Professional players use this volleyball tipping technique to give themselves another opportunity to attack the ball.

The way to do this is to aim the ball at the wrists and forearms of the opposing teams blockers as they are in the height of their block against you.

One way a player like yourself, can save a broken play is to soft tip the ball into the block on purpose. This gives your team a chance to replay the ball. (Ralph Arvesen)

You do it by contacting the ball with the tips of your fingers and actually aiming it for the blockers wrists and arms so the ball will bounce back high off of their arms and back into your court in a way that your team, who should be covering you in defense as you hit the ball, has a chance to easily replay the ball, digging it back to your setter so she can set up another play.

Where do you need to go now? Here are three options: 

1. Learn more about How To Spike A Volleyball by checking the links in Related Links section.
2. Follow the suggested reading on our Sitemap page Learning How To Play (Sitemap)
3. Or visit the pages in the How To Play Volleyball section in the drop down menu at the top of the page.

1. Improve Your Volleyball Performance with Private Volleyball Coach April Chapple
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2. Volleyball Tips on Playing Better and Improving Your Basic Skills
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3. Volleyball Tipping 6 Attack Strategies Outside Hitters Use To Score

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