Today’s video is the first in a new series that will focus on fitness. Being in shape is incredibly important if you want to play high-level tennis. Matches can last hours and your technique will suffer if you’re not fit and you get tired down the stretch. Further, fitness can improve your ability to hit forehands, backhands, serves, etc. You’ll be more explosive, more powerful, and have better balance. This video looks at some plyometric exercises. We use a box provided courtesy of OnCourtOffCourt.com — check them out via the image below!
Please let us know what you think of this fitness lesson and what you’d like to see in the future via comments below! Thanks.
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Wow what a great exercise I really appreciate FYB on making this video. I cant wait to see more who knew something that looks so easy be so tiring
great video! i didn’t have a box, but i just tried it off the floor and i still feel the muscles working. i’ll have to check out the real plyo box. i’d love to see more videos on fitness. thanks FYB
it’ s really fantastic and important ; thanks FYB
Great initiative Will, fitness is a key part of tennis that I always found really hard to work on, just because the advices are so various, and you never really know what to do and when. Introducing a consistent Fitness program that we can follow is a great idea! Thanks again for all your work!
Thanks for the tip, Will
One more thing to think about when doing this sort of exercise is to make sure your hip – knee – and foot are all in alignment so that you don’t torque your patellar tendon (below the kneecap) at a funky angle. In other words, rotate at the waist, not the knee. Don’t let your knee bend inward towards the other side of your body. Prevention is the always the best treatment!
This is a great peace of advice. Thanks for adding this!
Hey no problem,
Here’s a real life situation that I ran into this summer: I finished my first year of D2 tennis this past spring, and after taking a couple weeks off, I starting playing again. This is when I began feeling a sharp pain in my knee… Needless to say, it’s been 1.5 months of exercises and ice massages and the discomfort when going up and down stairs has not gone away. You don’t realize how important proper form is until something like this happens. I’ve had to reevaluate my whole game to see where I can make it easier on my knee, especially my serve. (An orthopedic doctor diagnosed me) I’m guessing the HPC section will focus on technique and form just as much as the tennis lesson section and that’s fantastic!
Hi,
Thats great that you from FYB are concerned about fitness. Im having a lot of physical problems with my legs, and I´ll appreciate if you continue to develop this side of tennis techniquies.
Thank you FYB.
i love this site, I tell everyone i know to visit and learn. GREAT addition of the fitness vids. I would love to see some more on ankle fitness, i have real problems with both my feet. I now have a bone spur going on!
Brilliant to have someone help others understand just how much conditioning goes on behind the scenes. The better you get, the harder you hit, the fitter you need to be to stay injury-free. Another great tutorial.
Poly-metric Exercises,
Will, when did it get that name? I did similar stuff back in the 90’s and I called it step Aerobics. I could never dance worth a darn so I did similar things you showed during the class with loading. Strange looks but hey it worked for me. Used good high steps though, not some flimsy thing. I few years ago, I saw someone using a treadmill on the court. Talk about dangerous. Good stuff. Now, how can an old man do this without hurting lol.
great fitness lesson. i’ll definitely try these out and look forward to seeing more fitness videos. i enjoy fyb videos because they are direct, accessible and clearly explained. keep up the good work!
hey you all from FYB, My name is Aris from Brazil … i started playing tennis by 5 months ago and since i found this website with free lessons i have been watching it very often… I have to say thanks, it`s helping me a lot!. About the tennis fitness videos, i think this i a great ideia… with the tennis lessons + the tennis fitness` videos we can improve our tennis level and also prevent many problems with injuries. Would be great if you could also give us some “special” tennis warm up exercices.
Great info,as a new instructor I find most new students need more conditioning just to get moving on the court. The poly-box is a GREAT example of loading and unloading body weight and balance, a weight transfer concept I find most new students are challenged to execute.
Keep the conditioning articles coming, if conditioning gets boring for the students, then you know it gets old doing the same moves for the instructor.
Thanks in advance,
Dave
Will — love the fitness tips. I’ve been a fitness instructor for 18 years and an avid tennis player for 10 — I know I’ve won a lot of matches because my opponent got tired and I didn’t. Looking forward to more great “tennis specific” tips! I’d love to see drills to help improve my footwork incorporated into a fitness segment. (hope that makes sense!) You have a great site — keep up the good work.
I agree that Roddick’s return of serve lost him the game — however — re Fed/Roddick serve — what about placement? While Fed’s mechanics are the same, he seemed to place the ball so well compared to Roddick. Federer’s placement of the serve was simply outstanding in the 5th set — incredibly tight/unreachable. Federer had an outstanding service game and what seemed visually (I dont know the stats off hand) a so so baseline/rally game compared to Roddick. How much do you think placement, vs being “unreadable” was a factor — or is Roddick simply unable to read Federer’s serve. Does Fed/Rod history show similar disparity?
This is not true plyometric training. It is more contolled impact. I’m an exercise physiologist and enjoy this website, but I do need to bring this to your attention.
Easy and fantastic exercise. I will make a box similar to a poly box for myself and start doing the exercise even from home. Keep us posted on new tips. Thanks
Victorino
Bad! It is pure commercial… I like your perspective of the game… please don’t get out of the track… the exercise is great but selling those boxes was a bad move.
I have no problem with it at all. It is important to use the right equipment for safety and effectiveness, and I don’t see anything wrong with pointing viewers to a site that sells those equipments. Even if FYB gets some profits from it, as long as the equipment works, why not. It is a lot of effort to maintain a site as high quality as FYB.
I have no problem with it — all media is supported by advertising in one way or another — this is advertising/product recommendation. He does a terrific website and needs to make money doing it. as long as his recommendations seem appropriate and pricing fair, happy to have the recommendations. Up to me to ignore them or not.
Hey! thanks for the video. It looks good. I should try it some time.
Will, this is a very good step for FYB. I’ve been looking for some relatively simple and easy pliometric exercises to do to help with tennis. I hope you have more ideas on these area. Pliometrics are wonderful body weight drills that can be done with minimal equipment in almost no time at all on a regular basis.
Hi Will,
Two comments:
I coach high school tennis teams – Varsity boys and girls. It’s not practical to have the teams carry many, many pylo boxes up to the courts and back again after use. Storage is a real problem as well. Can you show other tennis fitness exercises that can be incorporated for a team of 18 kids on four courts ?……. Fitness exercises that do not involve other equipment?
Second, is it possible to watch your instructional videos and have a way to click and get a FULL screen view like I have seen at other non-tennis sites?
Thanks for the great job that you do. You may have the best tennis instructional site that I have ever seen.
Hi Jim. We’ll be making a number of fitness videos that don’t require anything other than a place to run / jump / etc. RE: your second question, if you click the button to the right of the “HD” button, that will put the video in full-screen mode.
As an addendum, the HD button doesn’t appear until you play the video. You basically want the button that’s second from the right.
Will, looks great! I have learned a lot from your website. my friends are wondering why I am harder to beat at present and most of the time I beat them. Thanks to your tips!
do you have some exercises for the neck and shoulders? Sometimes i feel it is very stiff.
Will, I dont care if it is bad commercial or not true polymetric as some says, what is important it helps! keep up the good work!
Hi Will,
Great new section Will! Please also add a section regarding to stretch and warm-up, warm-down routines. Many many thanks for providing this site, especially free!
Hey these are all great videos! But i would like to see a video with exercises that we should do right before a match, as a team for example
Wow, you’ve got me very impressed with this video. I tried it – not on a plyobox – and the movement really gets me exhausted.
By the way, i have one question. You mentioned about this exercise movement associates with Open stance hitting. Can this exercise be shadowing strokes on other stances?
Many many thanks for the video!!!
Hi Pete. Yes, you can use the exercise for other stances. We did a number of other exercises w/this box but the video would have been too long if we included them all. The good news is that we have plenty of material to make new videos with!
Thanks to everyone for the kind words. Please keep the feedback coming… that will help us enormously with subsequent videos.
thanx for all you have done specilally for this new section .
i am from iran and we dont have any good suorce here for learning tennis and your site its great for us.
good luck
Great video! I am from Russia and we have different problems with source of modern information…
Thank you very much!
Thank you FYB. I am a tennis coach and fitness instructor in Australia and greatly appreciate all instruction especially on tennis specific exercises. Well done Mate and keep it coming…..
Very great video, I’m glad I made FYB my new tennis coach.. lol, you’re already better than 1 of my high school tennis instructors.
Will, thanks for anohter great video. Can you talk about breathing techniques when you get a chance?
Federer’s superior serving in the finals was due to several factors. First, we have to consider the focus factor. This was a huge match for him against an opponent that he had had much success in the past. This added focus and motivation allowed him to hit more aces against Roddick than against other opponents. Also, when the match got very close, Andy was forced to guess on the returns. This allowed Federer to relax more and hit the open spots on the court more easily or effectively. Finally, we must consider that Roddick was trying to make it happen while Roger was simply letting it happen. Big Factor in the crunch moments of the match.
great idea to move into plyometric exercises – very important stuff indeed. could you please elaborate more on the basic things to be followed in order to avoid possible negative effects when you do a complex training plyometric programme ?
i love it…
thank you!
the real surprise for me was that Federer lost the frist set.roddick returned well in that set but it was federer who made errors not roddick coming up with winners.i think federer was nervous.the second set went to a tiebreak and only then did federer wake up and start to play well.the same for the third tiebreak.at this point the only thing federer had to do was hold serve and roddick would have lost the fourth set and the match.so my point is this why did federer let roddick back into the match to force the last set showdown.sometimes even great players can get tight.this match was more about federer playing below par than it was roddick playing above himself cause federer still won.
Great stuff, Will! I cannot say enough good things about this initiative in general. I’ll check out oncourtoffcourt.com to see if they ship to the Netherlands. The Box seems kind of heavy. S&H and customs might be a pain.
Speaking of pain. Two months ago I badly injured my groin and have been having physical therapy ever since. I’m about 90% recoverd and what start adding more plyometric exercises to my regimen. I’m 34 and need to pay much more attention to my physical condition. I’ll keep an eye on your site what other routines FYB comes up with. Once again, absolutely great stuff. Best regards, Jevon.
The web site hijacked my web browser by having a pop-up salesman pushing a sale, and there was no way, provided such as cancle button, to stop the dialogue. Fraund!
My answer to the question, “Why does one lose more second service points than first?”
Answer: A second service point is closer to purely probabilistic play than a first service point. Suppose we begin watching two players in progress with neither player appearing to hold an advantage. Then the probability of either player winning the point is akin to the players’ “odds of winning” talent. For example, prior to Roddick’s fine effort at Wimbledon, most might favor Federer over Roddick on the order of something like 60-40. Thus, for the hypothetical random point, we’d expect Roddick to lose about 60% of such points. Unquestionably, everyone’s good first serve commences a point at a heavy server advantage; that is, the situation is more removed from the above hypothetical than would be the case on the second serve. With a second serve, play commences with an advantage for the server, but nothing like the advantage presented with a good first serve. At a professional level, such as with Roddick vs. Federer, Roddick doesn’t lose the full 60% (he might well win over 50%). At levels such as mine (3.5-4.0) server will lose almost the exact percent corresponding to the opponents odds of winning the random point. (The great Baltimore Orioles coach Earl Weaver would have loved this purely “numbers” analysis. In truth, I, a devout White Sox fan, do hold a Ph.D. in mathematics!)
thanks fytb
I have a foot step that is a foot high… can’t I jsiut use that? I mean like a step to help you reach things? Its not as heavy as the box you used but its definetly high enough and I won’t slip off it.
is the demonstration without the swing for a righty?
Why are you doing it the opposite direction you would rotate in the actual swing?
And do you put your outside foot (the one you push off from in the swing) on the box or on the court?
is the demonstration without the swing for a righty?
Why are you doing it the opposite direction you would rotate in the actual swing?
And do you put your outside foot (the one you push off from in the swing) on the box or on the court?
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