Pre-Match Warm-Up Rituals

The following post is an excerpt from Match Chart Collection.  Thanks for visiting, Frank Giampaolo

 Pre-Match Warm-Up Rituals

Before each PGA tournament round, Tiger Woods warms up every club in his golf bag, just in case he needs it. In the high performance tennis world, players who routinely warm up both their primary and secondary strokes have a major advantage in tightly contested matches. Grooving fundamentals before a match is important, but let’s go deeper.

A first-set tiebreak can often come down to a player executing a winning secondary stroke such as a swing volley or topspin lob.  To confidently perform secondary shots at crunch time, without hesitation, stems from properly warming them up before the match. Players who neglect their secondary strokes have a very different mind-set when faced with the same exact situation. Instead of instinctively moving forward to hit the swing volley to take the tiebreaker, they hesitate and are caught thinking, “I don’t remember the last time I hit one of these? Can I make it? Should I go for it?”  Now guess who misses the easy shot, gets upset and blows another breaker?

Obviously, any stroke has to be developed on the practice court long before tournament competition begins. Once developed properly, it should be placed into your match day tool belt.

ASSIGNMENT

Make a brand new normal warm up routine. Leave the old school warm up routine behind and begin to warm up in the manner that you are expected to perform.

The 5 different forehands and backhands:

1. Primary drive ground strokes
2. High and heavy ground strokes
3. Short angle/side door ground strokes
4. Slice and drop shots
5. Defensive lobs

The 3 different serves:

1. Flat serve
2. Slice serve
3. Kick serve

The 5 different volleys:

1. The basic punch volley
2. The swing volley
3. The drop volley
4. The half volley
5. The transition mid court volley.

The 2 different overheads:

1. Stationary, service box overheads
2. The turn and run, scissor kick overhead with movement

The 5 different approach shots:

1. Serve and volley
2. Return and charge
3. Moon-ball approach to swing volley
4. Traditional approach to volley
5. Spot a vulnerable opponent and steal the volley

Let’s return to the golf analogy. Tiger Woods knows that each day’s course conditions dictate his upcoming club options. Within your tennis world, your warm up is often dictated by the style of opponent you’ll be facing in the up-coming match. For example, if you know that your next opponent is a Moon Ball/ Pusher, it might be wise to warm up your swing volleys, side doors and drop shots.

Often, what separates two talented players is the time and

energy put into properly preparing for battle.

Contact: Frank Giampaolo
FGSA@earthlink.net
MaximizingTennisPotential.com
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