Hi Richard,

On a normal forehand (without extra topspin) the hand does not engage at all. At least not actively, voluntary.

Some players like Federer relax their wrist so much that it acts like a hinge. So their hand (with the racket) then swings freely “off the wrist” and he is able to control the ball.

Most other people cannot do that. So even in his case on a typical forehand he doesn’t engage the hand, he lets it swing freely.

He would engage the hand maybe on a shorter ball where he would want more topspin.

The way I play and I suggest people to play is to NOT engage the hand at any point.

I did a comparison between Halep and Federer forehand and Halep does not engage the wrist / hand.

https://www.feeltennis.net/forehand-wrist-lag/

You can watch her in slow-motion and observe at around 1:50:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIV01Tcwd9g

What you see after contact is not engaging the hand but relaxing the wrist which until then was stable. Since the ball is gone we can now relax so the wrist lets go and the hand will move.

But that had nothing to do with contact. Again, I am describing a basic rally forehand from the baseline.

Here are two basic forehands in super slow motion and you can observe if you can see any wrist action at contact.

So I wanted first to share this that it’s clear to you that actively engaging the hand can be problematic.

If one does engage the hand, then it starts before contact as we are pulling out of a lag.

You are simply trying to accelerate the racket head faster and you would feel that if you also engage the hand it will help.