Pro Tennis’s Physical Requirements

Andrea Jaeger
4 min readJul 26, 2022

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The emotional and physical strains of playing professional tennis are examined in this article. Anaerobic fitness, Leg strength, and grip strength are also addressed in this article. For the best results, follow the advice in this article. Professional tennis players need strength in specific muscles and the ability to decelerate quickly. In addition, the ability to bear repetitive rotational and shear pressures should also be developed.
Tennis is a sport that requires a lot of mental toughness from its players.

A professional tennis player’s mental toughness is critical to their success. According to numerous studies, eighty percent of a tennis match is spent waiting. During this period, your emotional state might either help or hinder your performance. When it comes to sports, most players are preoccupied with getting their shots off and scoring goals. However, mental toughness is something that champions work on to improve their performance on the court. Mental toughness can help you perform better and win more tennis matches.

Many tennis players commit frequent errors by not focusing on their game. In the meantime, they’re thinking about the next game. It is because of this that they begin to wane in their intensity. As a result, the players’ intensity automatically rises to compensate for the dropped intensity. To play at your best, you must have a high mental concentration. As a result, staying focused on your game is critical.
a firm grasp

Experts have studied tennis match play extensively to see if grip strength is a key physical need for professional tennis. A correlation between grip strength and serve velocity, bench press, and vertical jump height has been observed. Several studies have shown that grip strength is linked to gender and arm length. The evidence points to women having a distinct advantage when it comes to grip strength. The post-test serve velocity was substantially correlated with women’s grip strength.

Tennis features a lot of vertically and horizontally jumping, which takes a lot of upper and lower body strength. The best place to perform a lateral crossover is in this position. This exercise demands a great level of flexibility, deceleration, and strength to be successful. So, the body has to be able to endure repeated shear and rotational stresses. A smash or serve, for example, necessitates that a player can jump high and land with precision.
Strength of the legs

Improved agility and serve-throwing speed can be achieved by increasing leg strength. Short accelerations and decelerations are necessary for tennis movement, which is primarily lateral. Elastic unilateral reactive workouts and COD movement will be covered in this article, which aims to enhance leg strength. Here are some leg-strengthening exercises that you may want to try. You will see improvements from each workout because it targets a certain area of the body.

Leg strength is an important factor to consider throughout a game. There is a lot of backtracking and 180-degree CODing in this game. Lateral leg strength may be less crucial than unilateral leg reactive strength. Responsive strength on landing and elastic energy saved from a previous jump were discovered in a study by Habibi et al. Additionally, the overall strength of a player’s legs can influence their ability to hit a ball.
An anaerobic workout.

Professional tennis players must improve their anaerobic fitness to perform at the highest level possible. Running is a great way to improve cardiovascular health, but it isn’t the only aerobic activity. Running for long periods can strengthen your heart and improve your ability to get oxygen into and out of your muscles. As a bonus, long runs can boost your muscle strength and speed, along with your capacity to burn fat and store energy… To put it another way, they’re great strategies to improve your body’s efficiency.

Tennis is a very physically demanding sport. Tennis players must be able to perform brief, high-intensity exercises even if they don’t need to run kilometers in a day. For tennis players to maintain pace with their opponents, constant movement is required. Therefore, tennis training would be incomplete without aerobic exercise. Tennis is not an anaerobic sport, yet it is critical for professional players to have a high level of aerobic fitness to strike the ball accurately.
Match-play time constraints

Even while match play in professional tennis may not be the essential component, the time constraints have an impact. Fans, players, umpires, and other off-field officials all suffer when a game goes on for an extended period. With its removal, the number of matches could be increased. Conversely, the rule’s elimination might lengthen games, although there is no proof that this is the case. Furthermore, evidence suggests that players make tactical use of inter-point time.

During a professional tennis match, the time it takes to complete a set varies greatly from player to player. It takes twenty seconds between points and 90 seconds between changes in the men’s singles tournament. Rallies are longer in women’s singles. This can be because people have different levels of expertise. High-level players may hit the ball more aggressively during rallies, leading to a shorter game.
Drills for training

Pro tennis players use a variety of training activities that emphasize the player’s movement. These types of movement include lateral, linear, and multidirectional motion. Often, these exercises are timed. For example, to receive the first ball, the players must sprint from their starting position to the baseline and rapidly return the ball. Fast-returning balls fed by their partner are an additional valuable drill. Shuttle sprints, backpedaling, and various tennis-related step types can all be part of these drills, which can be done off-court.

Tennis is a sport that requires a high level of agility. A player’s ability to react quickly and deftly is critical when the ball is hurled, twisted, and smacked. Interval bursts of 10–20 seconds at a high intensity followed by a brief rest time are essential to a solid training drill. These short bursts of activity prepare the body for the sport. Cardiovascular endurance is difficult to sustain on tennis courts, even though it might get quite hot.

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Andrea Jaeger
Andrea Jaeger

Written by Andrea Jaeger

Andrea still competes in Legends Tennis Events, donating all her prize money and asking fellow pro players, tennis fans and audiences worldwide to help match.