Tennis Workouts to Get Fit For Wimbledon

What is possibly Britains greatest annual sporting event is now upon us. Every year June brings the start of summer, strawberries and cream and Wimbledon, which is the Worlds most exciting grass court tennis tournament. So, how do the likes of Rafael Nadal, Andy Murray, Roger Federer, the Williams sisters or Dinara Safina train to be tennis superstars?
Tennis requires a combination of strength, speed, agility, fast reflexes and above all, endurance. Legs provide the base of a tennis player, and they have to be strong and agile. Shoulders and arms are essential for power play, and the core should be able to hold it all together.

Interval Training For Tennis

Tennis involves relatively short periods of intensity followed by rest. So jogging 5 miles a day will not create a good player. Interval training is the key. If you can use a tennis court for training, after a warm up perform sprints along on length, followed by recover jog along the base line, then another sprint. Also run backwards and sideways along the widths. The keys is to learn to endure short intensive periods, and then take ‘active rest’ i.e. jogging, to recover, but vitally not to stop. On court often the fitter player will win.

Circuit Training for Tennis

Press ups, crunches, star jumps, squat thrusts, squats and lunges are all excellent ways to prepare the body for tennis.

Strength Training for Tennis

Tennis, as with all sports, is as much a game of strength as skill. Last year there was a lot of meduia attention on both Nadal and Murray regarding who was the strongest and fittest player. Murray even flexed his biceps on court to deomonstrate that he was taking strength training seriously.

The core strength exercises are squats, lunges, calf raises, flyes, leg extensions and curls. All strength training should be done in moderation during competition season to ensure recovery is made before a match. Squats and lunges provide strong legs, but aim for muscular endurance rather than attempting to hit your one rep max on every training session.

All types of bicep curls should be performed, standard, hammer curls, preacher curls and also wrist curls.

Flyes can be done on a bench with dumbbells or as cable flyes. These help to improve your hitting power.

Lateral raises, done with dumbbells, can help improve back hand power too.

Strentching all mucles well after training is essential, so always allow time for at leaat 10 minutes of stretching after your workout.

Tennis requires a perfect balance between core strength, agility, flexibilty and endurance.

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