Yeah, I know it sounds like this post belongs to one of the more boring tennis tips but trust me, it will help you to solve the struggle in your tennis game you have right now. It is simple. If you have problems in Tennis it is most likely something coming from your bad (or not yet professional) footwork. By the way: This article has affiliate links, which means I receive compensation if you purchase a product through this link. There are no additional costs for you. It helps me continuing this blog. Thanks for your support! Visit my disclosure page for more information. Just this day I had a hit with two friends for an hour each and I didn’t feel good on court at all. If you are looking for rare tennis tips that do NOT need thousand and thousand of repititions you are right on the spot to understand what exactly this “bad feeling” on court is. Don’t want to read everything and just get to the two tennis tips that improve your game in 3 weeks? Click here. Thanks to hckyso for the image of the running woman!

SEEING YOURSELF HERE?

Hitting fifty percent of my shots with the frame lead to many unforced errors, short balls, winners that turned out not to be winners and some racket throwing (which I rarely do). I should also mention that I was not playing with people that are out of my league or just had a great day on court while I was having one of the worse ones. No! Everything felt good as far as I can tell. Until I was trying to make contact with the ball. My right arm had to extend too much on easy forehands and sometimes was too close to my body. Even the shot that didn’t let me down in the last weeks, my longline backhand, was just going straight up over the net flying 1-2 metres over the baseline. Every single time! Not much spin involved. A few hours after the practice session I noticed that I was pretty much only hitting forehand and backhand longline shots eventhough I am a heavy topspin player that tries to freak you out with some nice angle-shots. What was going on? Why in the world would this happen to someone that is playing quite frequently (5-8 hours a week), picking up alot of match practice on tournaments and is playing with someone in his league? It is easy! I was just lazy. My footwork was just bad or not to say non-existing. You may ask what running has to do with problems on this particular day or what I mean by lazy. Let me explain my thoughts behind this gonzo headline.

ANALYZING YOUR PROBLEMS

You know that I dont’t write this just to cry about how bad I played or moved. I am trying to give you tennis tips that actually work and improve your game so at first I should sum up that all of the problems above come from hitting late or not bending your knees enough (which is only possible if you can hit early). If you ever realize that you are only hitting longline on nearly every occasion you should concentrate on hitting the ball alot earlier and step into field while hitting. This is a problem for a lot of players especially when the winter season starts and you play on faster courts like carpet. On this point it is worth mentioning that this makes Tennis alot more exhausting! If you face the same problem as I did with my backhand you should focus on your legs. Do you stand straight (knees not bend) and still try to hit the fast and flat ball of your opponent back with a crushing longline meteor? You will most likely not make it and it is simple physics. Imagine a golf player swinging with (nearly) straight legs and now thing about yourself sending back a flat ball of your opponent with straight legs.

The upper body will lay to the side so that your racket can reach the ball and make your racket having the same angle to the ground as the golf club. The result should be obvious. Not a single bit of topspin and a ball going straight up like a golf ball. As we all know this is a bad combination and makes you hit an error. On the other hand when bending your knees you can restore that standart angle your racket has to the ground as when hitting a ball on a comfortable height and add spin and therefore control to that ball. Just imagine a picture of David Ferrer or Grigor Dimitrov hitting a backhand. You will see their knees nearly on the ground. This way they get under the ball and have the racket face paralell to the ground and not straight down.

A lot of people think that running increases your stamina and makes you run for a longer period of time. Yes, that is absolutely right. “But it doesn’t make you faster so how does that fix your problems with hitting late?” Easy. Running increases your willingness of moving over and over and over again.

“Running increases your willingness of moving over and over and over again.”

If you have ever achieved a level of fitness where you can outstand every opponent you will understand what I am talking about. The fact that you have a huge amount of energy in moving makes you better and also makes practice more effective. Splitsteps, small correctionsteps, no high risk shots because you cant continue the rally, better knee bending, more power from your legs due to that and reaching balls not because you became faster but because you are ready to run not to say you want to run. It is hard to describe that feeling but it is something every tennisplayer should have at least for one time in his career because you will do everything to make that a neverending feeling. Some tennis tips are known by pretty much every player but only a few follow this basic one. Don’t think that you are fit enough and that there is no need to run just because you aren’t completely exhausted after a match or practice session.

THE MOST IMPORTANT TENNIS TIPS

I don’t want to turn this line of thought into a fitness guide so I’m not going to tell you every little step on how to become the next Lleyton Hewitt. What I am going to do is giving you those two tennis tips to improve your game extrenely fast (maybe the most important tennis tips for you).

YOUR CURRENT FOOTWORK LEVEL

You will be surprised by how fast the results show up. If you do this 10 times which means that you could achieve this in 3 weeks when starting now you will be a player that can beat your old non-running-self in two straight sets. How is this possible? Let me explain why running does not only affect the way you want to move but also your training. Most players I know rarely show any signs of being exhausted after a practice session with alot of baseline hitting. That is because we are minimalistic in those sessions because there can be no real winner so why should I give it everything I have? This is a no-brainer but I am sure this will make things clear. Because you get used to what you practice on court.

“You get used to what you practice on court.”

If you practice being lazy, you will be lazy in a match. If you practice being awesome, you will be awesome in a match. It is just that simple. Regulary going for a run makes you move better and more, makes you hit better and harder and also gives you the opportunity to practice longer. In a top 10 tennis tips list running should have a place right after the basic techniques of all strokes. I appreciate every comment and I am happy about your feedback whether you tried what you have read here or not. FourtyLove.com is all about tennis tips that work for everyone and this can only be achieved if you follow the thoughts of this post and put them into your game. I’m out, going for a run now (seriously :D). Bye!