Blog post - August 2021

With summer nearing its end and school and regular tennis training beckoning, we thought it was timely to look at how young players can take advantage of this next couple of weeks to get ahead and return to training in the best condition possible both in body and mind!

For coaches, September can be a crazy and challenging time getting everyone back into a full routine and perfecting everyone’s schedules, and some players may not have kept on top of their S&C programming, so to make it easier on everyone, here are some top tips to get players ready for getting back to training.

1. Get Active – Players should be completing some type of exercise daily, whether that be a 20-minute jog, other sports, or even more specific activities such as our SuperMovers warm-up session part 1 and part 2.
2. Managing Mindsets – It is time to get players’ minds back in the game and ready for their return to training. Setting alarms to...

This week's Exercise of the Week is actually a series of stability exercises, that come from the SuperMovers Level 2 programme.

They are partner drills, where each player takes turn to lead. You can also lead the drill as a coach/parent by challenging your player to touch your racket.

The series progresses from the most stable to least stable base.

1- Two-leg/Bilateral Exercise - Squat

2 - Split-Stance Exercise - Split-Squat

3 - Single leg/Unilateral Exercise - Single leg balance

The goal is to challenge your partner/player to reach and touch your hand/racket, while maintaining a good athletic position based on the type of stance.

For example, if you are performing the squat variation, they when observed from the side, you should still see a solid squat 'shape', using the legs to get low while trying to keep the body as upright as possible.

So if we observe the kinogram below, we can see that the 'follower' (player in pink top), actually doesn't use the legs well,...

Blog Post - August 2021

Tennis S&C start-up guide 

Are you new to introducing Strength and Conditioning (S&C) into physical programming for tennis?

Are you unsure on what elements of physical training you should do?

Do you know what makes a player tennis-fit?

Here, Howard Green shares the 5 building blocks needed to start your tennis fitness journey with. Incorporate them into your programming now and find out more about our membership offers here.

At Tennis SuperMovers we use the SMASH Curriculum to plan and deliver tennis S&C, this stands for Strength, Movement, Agility, Stability and Honing Coordination. By developing each of these areas, we develop a well-rounded tennis athlete, who is ready to train and compete to their full potential.

Below I will outline each of the SMASH components, explaining the goal and its transfer to tennis, I will also give you a video example of an exercise that develops that physical quality. We also have a series of blog...

Exercise of the Week - Agility - Movement into the court

How often do you get frustrated with your players about only moving side-to-side along the baseline? Not cutting diagonally in towards shorter balls, or orienting themselves to move to deep balls (to see an exercise to work on moving deep click here).

The impact of only moving sideways is that the player can have issue with their contact point, with the ball either dropping too low or bouncing too high. This week's drill develops the player's ability to cut inside the court to deal with short balls.

The video gives you a tutorial on how to execute the drill, then challenges you to follow-along and complete the drill as different speeds. This gives you the option to set the screen up and allow the player to follow the video as part of a session or circuit.

I want to explain where this particular drill fits within our Tennis SuperMovers programme - this exercise is a preview of an Agility drill from...

Blog Post - August 2021

When players come back to full training blocks in September, coaches wonder why their player's have lost their edge. Often it is because they simply haven't been completing enough speed and power work to maintain their performance levels.

With a focus this week on speed and how to maintain conditioning over summer, I want to introduce you to some of the guiding principles used in strength and conditioning (S&C), with a focus on the principle of reversibility. These principles drive my programme design and decision making as an S&C coach. I have added an explanation of each, along with a tennis specific example so you can utilise them in your programming.

Individuality – Each athlete is unique and responds differently to training, which can be influenced by elements such as - biological age, training age, gender and body type.

For example - we may have two young tennis athletes of the same age, however one player has been doing...

Coaches often ask me 'why do my players all come back in September slower?' My reply often involves asking 'how frequently over the summer period have they done speed and power work?' Unfortunately the answer is either 'none' or 'I don't know'.

The ways in which I combat this in the competitive season is to add jumps, sprint mechanics, short sprints (5-15 metres) and change of direction drills in the players' extended warm-ups – which they complete in their morning practice at tournaments, and warm-ups prior to tennis lessons back at base.

In addition to these frequent exposures, I will aim to see the players every 7-10 days where possible between tournaments to go through a more in-depth speed and power session. The reason for this is that speed is a physical quality that can start to deteriorate in as quick as 2 days! If you want to read more about this, check out this blog.

With this in mind, this week's Exercise of the Week is a simple lateral speed drill. For...

Blog Post - July 2021

A common question from players I get is ‘can I still do cardio or running?’ Often players complete a huge amount of training during the week – on-court and in the gym and then - off-plan - they also go out and knock out 5k or 10k runs at the weekend with family or friends. And, with summer holidays now in full swing and training programmes less rigid, it is important to bear in mind any social activity that may impact training loads.

Whether it’s because players enjoy running or whether they feel like they still have to factor in cardio training in their fitness, it’s important that players, parents and coaches are up front and on the same page when it comes to their physical training and some boundaries are set – at the very least to ensure there are no overuse injuries to hamper a player’s season.

Common injuries we see in players from over-training and running include knee pain, and sore heels, and usually...

Last week's Exercise of the Week introduced how we would create a warm up for our players, where the content follows a format called the RAMP warm up, this stands for Raise, Activate, Mobilise, Potentiate. 

The goal of each section is:

Raise - heart rate and body temperature

Activate - the key muscles

Mobilise - the key joints

Potentiate - put simply, we want to 'fire up' the body and brain.

With the summer competitive season starting, it's really important players are completing good pre-tennis RAMP warm-ups. This week we focus on one drill in the activate section. With this drill we work on hip and shoulder stability, both of which are vital for tennis players.

Add this drill in after completing some locomotor patterns across the court (jog, backpedal, side-step, skip, etc). Follow with some key fundamental movement patterns, such as lunges, and finish with some jumps, sprints, decelerations and changes of direction.

Check out last week's exercise - Exercise of...

Blog Post - July 2021

After a fantastic weekend of being a team captain for two of our teams at the National Junior Club League finals at the National Tennis Centre, London, where we won two titles with our U12 Girls and U14 Boys, I wanted to share some thoughts on what I believe makes a successful player.

Having worked with many junior and professional tennis players over the years, I have come to notice a number of qualities and traits that successful tennis players all share, whether they are 10 years old or 30 years old.

Preparation – Focus and preparation are key. From the smallest things, such as turning up on time, bringing a towel and water bottle to every training session and bringing the energy. Creating good habits ensures players are well prepared for what they experience on-court. I talk a lot about the concept of rehearsal within my philosophy and this rings true here – you do not rise to the levels of your match goals, you drop to the level of your...

This week's video gives you a sneak peek of the warm up we use with our performance players. The content follows a format called the RAMP warm up, this stands for Raise, Activate, Mobilise, Potentiate.

The goal of each section is:

Raise - heart rate and body temperature

Activate - the key muscles

Mobilise - the key joints

Potentiate - put simply, we want to 'fire up' the body and brain.

With the summer competitive season starting, it's really important players are completing good pre-tennis RAMP warm-ups. This week we focus on one drill in the mobilise section. With this drill we work on hip and upper back mobility, both of which are vital for tennis players.

Add this drill in after completing some locomotor patterns across the court (jog, backpedal, side-step, skip, etc). Follow with some key fundamental movement patterns, such as lunges, and finish with some jumps, sprints, decelerations and changes of direction.

 Check out this week's exercise on strength - ...