Last Thursday, I held my first ever workshop for tennis coaches at Batchwood Sport Centre in St. Albans, Herts. I developed theĀ half-day workshop to show tennis coaches how to effectively and safely warm-up their players before training or a match to increase their speed and agility on courtĀ and improve the accuracy and consistency of their shots.
Above you can see the tennis coaches who attended on the day wanting to add tools to their coaching toolbox to help their players. They were a really great bunch who I enjoyed sharing my tips and tricks with.
Above you can see me teaching The Feldenkrais Shoulder-Spine Integrator. A great mobiliser of the shoulder joint, shoulder girdle and upper spine.
To make things practical, I suggested that the mobiliser exercises should be prioritised as time is often limited for warm-ups. You just don’t have time to do it all!
Above, I am demonstrating The Feldenkrais Hip-Pelvis Integrator. A great exercise to mobilise the hip, pelvis and lower spine.
Above, you can see me teaching The Neck/Trunk Trainer. This increases rotation of the spine, which enables more powerful serves and groundstrokes to be performed as it allows more distance between the top of the Trophy Position or Set Position to contact point, which gives more time to build momentum before contact. I recommend doing this prior to any on-court warm-up
In this overhead shot, you can see how I used sprint hurdles and cones to perform drills to get the neuromuscular system fired up which enables the player to be ‘game ready’ right from the start.
Above, you can see me demonstrating The Lateral Squat Hop with a Medicine Ball. This warms up the most important movement in tennis – side to side movement!!!
Above, you can see me demonstrating how to lower the centre of gravity prior to split-stepping and then moving laterally at speed. Again a very important movement in tennis.
In this final image, you can see one of the participants performing a side-hop over hurdles to forward sprint. This helps not only warming-up in two important planes of motion for tennis, but also excites the nervous system right before play so the player is game ready.
If you would like more information on future workshops, please feel free to email us at info@bodychek.co.uk.
If you would like to order my book, “The Tennis Biomechanics Manual”, please click here.