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Strengthening drills
Racket and string technology is steadily increasing and more open stance groundstrokes are being used in tennis, which puts extra strain on a player’s wrists and arms. Building strength in the muscles surrounding the joints in your arm can help prevent injuries during your tennis career. One simple drill you can try to build up your arm strength is to throw balls as hard as possible. You can start throwing with tennis balls, then graduate to baseballs and footballs. Incorporate this into your daily drills and throw for fun with friends when you can. Eventually, you may even be able to throw light medicine balls, which can help give your tennis serve some extra power.
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Groundstroke drills
For this drill, your tennis coach (or a partner) will toss the ball in front of you for a forehand. Once the ball bounces, catch it and throw it back. Then, the person throwing the ball immediately tosses it to your backhand, which you once again catch and throw back. The speed and distance should increase as the drill goes on. Once you have the motion of your tennis strokes and side steps down, you can add your racket and start hitting the balls instead of catching and throwing them (the thrower may need a basket of balls for this). You can also set up a ball machine on the other side of the court that automatically feeds you balls. Practice trying to time your split step with each shot.
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Volley drills
To practice volleys, player A stands at the net while player B feeds them different kinds of volleys from the baseline. Alternatively, both players can stand at the net, volleying to one another and keeping the ball in the air for as long as possible. To increase the challenge, the person at the baseline should feed balls directly at the center of the net player’s body, forcing them to decide in the moment whether to perform a forehand volley or backhand volley.
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Lob and overhead drills
This exercise has one player stand at the tennis court’s baseline, and the other at the center mark of the service line (the “T” connecting the service boxes). The person at the service line rushes close enough to the net to touch it with their tennis racket, and at the same time, the person at the baseline feeds them a lob. The person at the net will then have to practice running or backpedaling fast enough to catch the overhead smash at the right time and put away a winner. You can repeat this drill five to 10 times, then switch turns to practice your lobs.
