If you haven’t already figured this out the hard way, tennis and pickleball require an immense amount of core strength to prevent your back from straining during hard strokes, volleys, and serves.
Improved efficiency in your arms and legs starts with a strong core. There are benefits to neutral-spine movements like planks, but if you want to simulate the demands your core is put under during a tennis match, you’re going to have to do better than that!
These are exercises we use with all our tennis and pickleball players to keep their bodies resilient and injury-free with whatever the sport may bring.
Paloff press – This is an advanced core movement that requires your obliques to work to maintain your balance in your lower body, and a centered upper body. This is what we call an anti-rotation exercise. This means your core is fighting to stay neutral through a rotational stress. This is exactly what your core is required to do in tennis and pickleball any time you reach your arms out and behind or in front of your body.
Bird dog – This is another anti-rotation exercise that again works the core in a similar way that Tennis demands. Because you are moving your limbs away from your core, you are working to maintain it in a neutral position. These can be made easier or harder in many ways, watch the video for demonstration!
Squat with press out – this is both a lower body strength and core exercise combined, we love accomplishing two things at once! This is less of an anti-rotation exercise, and more of a way to train neutral spine stability. It’s one thing to isolate the core, but can you maintain a strong position while simultaneously deep squatting and again moving the weight away from you? This is a tough one, but very effective!
Watch the video below for demonstrations and explanations of all these exercises as well as a few progressions.
Are you an active adult or athlete living in Roswell, Johns Creek, or Alpharetta, and experiencing some pain or other issue that is holding you back from playing tennis or pickleball? Since 2008 our proven 3 step plan has helped people stay in the game and keep doing all the awesome activities they love. Please give us a call or text at 678-400-0300.
