a 5:1 rotation is the most common rotation and volleyball and in this video I will be teaching you everything you need to know to be performing this rotation like a pro as soon as you start learning it so the 5 in the 5 one stands for the fact that there are 5 hitters on the court and the 1 stands for the single setter who will rotate all the way around on the screen I have to pick through the different positions that are available including the right-sided hitter who is opposite of the setter the two middle blockers who are opposite of each other and the two outside hitters who are opposite of each other and we also have the setter right here now the number one after some of these players positions denotes the two hitters who are closest to the center and the number 2 denotes the two hitters who are further away from the center we also have the Libero or the defensive specialist who will generally be subbing for the middles in the back row now there are two concepts that you need to know before we delve into the actual rotations the first is the actual rules of rotation which states that players positions on the court are determined by the players adjacent to them so for example here we have the setter who is next to the outside hitter and the Libero and she is not allowed to pass in front of the outside hitter or to the left of the Libero if she did that she would be considered out of rotation now looking at the middle there's actually three different players who are next to the Libero so this is saying that the Libero cannot cross to the left of the outside hitter to the front of the middle blocker or to the right of the center now let's just look through all the other positions on the court and their boundaries now the second concept that you need to know is the concept of base positions or defensive positions and this states that whenever the ball crosses to the opposing side players should switch to their base positions and typically what you'll see here is that you'll have the outside hitter come to the front left here the middle blocker come to the middle the right side hitter on the right the setter in the back right libero in the middle back and the other outside hitter in the back left the reason it is so important to get into your bass positions is that it allows all of the players to become highly specialized in their specific role so for example if you are an outside hitter you will always be getting to this front left position which means you will always be hitting from this left side of the court this helps you really develop a strength in hitting outside sets from the center same goes for the middle blocker who will get used to hitting the setters middle sets and the right side hitter who will get used to hitting on the right the setter is in the back right because this allows the easiest access to get to their proper setting position about right here in the Libero and the outside hitter are actually somewhat interchangeable so your coach may want your outside hitter to play in the middle back and the Libero to play in the left back but in this video I will be having the Libero play in the middle back just for the sake of clarity now I'm just gonna run through an example play so the ball comes over the net and the Libero gets the pass as soon as the setter notices that they are not required for the pass she is going to release to the net at the same time all of the players at the net are going to get ready to hit and now the setter can set whoever she likes whether that's the outside hitter the middle blocker or the right-sided hitter so let's have a brief recap of what we've covered so far what is a 5:1 rotation this is a rotation in which you have five hitters and one setter we've covered the rules of rotation which state that you can't cross past the players next to you and we've also covered the concept of getting to your base positions as soon as the ball crosses the net now let's look at the first rotation we have the serve so the setter is going to get back and ready to serve now what you're going to notice is that the players in the front are kind of going to bunch up in the middle here this is because the right-sided hitters base position is in the front right here and the outside hitters base position is in the front left here and this is the quickest way for them to get to those positions without breaking the rules of rotation we're also going to push the outside hitter and libero to where they should be and the setter is going to serve the ball as soon as the ball is contacted the rules of rotation no longer apply and all players are free to release to whatever positions they need to get to so you'll see that the two players in the front will immediately run to their base position and the setter will run to her base position and now we are in the same base positions that I showed you a few slides earlier moving on to the next rotation we have lost the point and we are now in serve receive the problem with this rotation as it is right now is that the setter is currently passing and we don't want that because if the setter passes then they will be unavailable to set so you'll notice that in all of these serve receive rotations we're going to be hiding the center away from passing the way that most teams achieve this is by having this outside hitter step all the way back to pass and you will notice that the rules of rotation are not being broken the setter is not crossing to the front of the outside hitter it is not crossing to the left of the Libero as well the outside hitter is not crossing to the left of the middle back and is not crossing behind the setter so all of these players are still in rotation now the serve comes over and you'll notice that the setter immediately left her position to get into her proper setting position and all of these players got ready to hit as soon as the outside hitter knew that she wasn't passing she got to the right to hit now the setter can set and set any player that she wants as seen here now the ball has crossed to the other side of the net so what do we need to do we need to get into base positions and a lot of times you'll hear a team saying switch which reminds everybody to get into their base positions now remember the outside hitter needs to get to the front left and the right side hitter needs to get to the right front and the setter needs to get to the back right so what you'll see them do is they'll switch and get to their base positions and the center will drop back to their base position one alternative your coach may have you do in this rotation is instead of having the outside hitter drop back to pass you'll actually have the setter push up and the right-sided hitter will drop back to pass instead as you can see this right-sided hitter is still in position as long as they do not cross to the right of the middle blocker or behind the outside hitter now we've won the point and it is our time to serve so all of the players will rotate by one position and the outside hitter will now get ready to serve because the outside hitter is not on the court the setter can actually push all the way to their base position and the Libero can also get to their base position right away in the front row you'll see that the middle blocker will get to the middle like this and the right side will get ready to move to her base position in the front right as soon as the ball is contacted the players are free to release and get to their base positions another quick example play ball comes to the Libero setter releases to the net when she sees she's not required for the pass and she will be able to set whoever she likes okay now we're in serve receive for rotation - now this is an interesting one because the setter is in the middle and we're gonna have to find a way to hide the center away from passing so looking at their boundaries they cannot cross in front of the right side to the left of the Libero or to the right of the outside hitter so what we do in this rotation is we have the setter go all the way up to the right side and then we have all of these players kind of scoot over to the right like this the Libero moves to the middle to pass and the outside hitter drops back to pass again the outside hitter must stay in front of the Libero in order to be in rotation and if you look at this all of the players are still within their rules of rotation now the ball comes over the middle blocker is going to run over to the middle to get ready to hit and the right side and outside are going to get ready to hit and the setter can set anybody that they like now that the ball has crossed to the other side of the net what do we do we get into base positions so switch so the center needs to get to the back right here the outside hitter gets to the back left and the two other players get up to the net ready to block and now we are back in base positions now we've won the point everybody rotates by one position now the Libero is not allowed to play in the front row so here they're going to step out for the middle blocker and immediately come back in for the middle in the back this is so the Libero can now serve and be ready for defense we want all the players to get as close to the base positions as possible without breaking the rules of rotation so you see the middle blocker will get into the middle here the setter will get here because this will help them get to the back right as early possible now the Libero serves and all the players will now go to their base positions now serve receive for rotation three the center is currently bounded by these two players as depicted here and what we're gonna do is we're going to push the setter all the way up to the middle of the court kind of like this and you can see they're still not crossing in front of the middle blocker and they're still not crossing to the right of the outside hitter now looking at the outside hitter here they cannot cross to the left of the middle or behind the outside hitter so what they're actually gonna do is they're gonna come all the way here like this and act as one of the passers now the ball comes over the net and the setter gets ready to set all these players get ready to hit and now this time the ball goes to the middle blocker as soon as the ball crosses the net what do we do we get into base positions so the outside hitter needs to get to the back left here libero in the middle setter on the back right and everybody's back in base positions an alternative setup that you may see for this rotation is having the outside hitter and the middle blocker stack in the top left here like this and then having this Center come up while the right-sided hitter drops back to pass now it's our turn to serve again so everybody rotates by one position the right side gets ready to serve and we're gonna try and get these players to set up in their base position as quickly as possible so they're gonna stack in the middle like this when the ball is hit they are free to release so the setter is going to come to the right here outside to the left here and the right side will get ready here now for serve receive in rotation for what you'll typically see is the center will get into the top-left corner like this the middle blocker will come and stack over there with them the right-sided hitter will drop back and not be acting as a pastor for this rotation and these two players will drop back and pass now what happens here is the outside hitter was next to the middle blocker and the right-sided hitter so actually this player can drop all the way over here and is still not going to the left of the middle blocker or behind the right-sided hitter so they are still in rotation even though they've come all the way from the opposite side of the court alternatively some teams may want the right-sided hair to be passing instead so you could just have this player stack up in the left with them and have the right side hitter pass but for this sample play we're just gonna have this player still drop back and be passing here the reason this is so effective is because it allows this outside hitter to be hitting from the left side of the court which is their specialty position so the ball is going to come over players are going to release and now the ball is going to go to the setter who sets the outside hitter and notice how in this depiction I've actually had all the pastor's come in a little bit just to cover for the hitter in case they get blocked so they can pick up any of these short balls that land around here now as soon as the ball is crossed over the net we need to get into base positions so switch the players in the front row are more or less already in their base positions and the other players in the back row move like this and now we are back in base position okay service rotation five everybody rotates by one position the outside hitter gets ready to serve the middle blocker will come to the middle like this and these players will also get into their base positions as soon as possible now the outside hitter is actually going to serve from the left this time because this will help them get to their base position as quickly as possible the serve comes over and these players move to their base positions serve receive rotation five the most common rotation again is to have the right-sided hitter drop back now these two players are going to move over everybody still following the rules of rotation one alternative your coach may want you to do is actually have the right side of tibbitt pass and then this outside of here will just be covering short serves over here again for clarity we're just going to do this default rotation the serve comes over the middle blocker gets ready to hit over here and notice how the outside hitter passed but then immediately got ready to hit now the set goes to the outside hitter these players cover and now the ball is crossed to the other side of the net we need to switch so again the front row players are more or less already in their position the outside needs to get to the left the Libero needs to get to the middle and the right side needs to get to the right and now everybody's back in base positions rotation six service we're going to rotate one more time now the Libero again is front row so they're gonna sub out for the middle blocker the Libero can only serve for one of these middle blockers so this time the middle blocker is just going to serve themselves and now the middle blocker is going to go to the middle this outside hitter is going to get to the front left as soon as the ball is contacted and these players are also going to switch the ball is served and everybody gets into their base position now we've lost the point where in reserve received for rotation six the Libero can come back in for the middle back and we're gonna hide the right-sided hitter again the outside hitter can drop back to pass again not passing it to the left of the middle back or behind the outside hitter the center can get to their position an alternative if you wanted to have your right sided pass you could have these players stacked in the top left like this and the right side will come up to pass but again for clarity's sake we're gonna have the right-sided hidden for this play ball we'll come over to the Libero goes to the center middle hits everybody covers now we switch everybody gets into pace positions alright I hope that was helpful you probably will have to watch this video multiple times in order to catch everything but I think with repetition the pieces will really all start coming together and again the best way to practice this is really going to be in person and that's really going to help you solidify these rotations in your mind so thanks again for watching and let me know if you have any questions in the comments