How Do High-Performance Tennis Players Train Off Court?

High-performance tennis players don’t just train more.

They train with more purpose.

At a high level, hitting more balls and spending more hours on court is not enough. Players need to develop the physical qualities that allow them to move explosively, repeat high-intensity efforts, recover between points and matches, and maintain their level when fatigue sets in.

That’s where off-court tennis fitness training becomes so important.

After more than 20 years working with tennis players, from developing juniors through to some of the best players in the world, we have found that tennis fitness training needs to be structured, progressive and specific to the demands of tennis.

It’s not about collecting exercises. It’s about putting the right pieces together at the right time.

So, what should high-performance tennis players actually be doing off court?

1. Build a Strong Foundation

Strength is one of the foundations of high-performance tennis fitness.

Every time a player accelerates, decelerates, changes direction, pushes out of a wide position or produces force through a shot, they rely on strength.

But tennis strength training isn’t about trying to look like a bodybuilder.

The goal is to develop strength that supports the movements and physical demands of tennis.

That means developing areas such as lower-body strength, trunk control, stability and the ability to produce and absorb force. The stronger the foundation, the more potential a player has to develop other qualities such as speed and power.

2. Turn Strength Into Power

Being strong is important.

Being able to use that strength quickly is where it becomes valuable on court.

Tennis is an explosive sport. Players have very little time to react, move and produce force.

Power training can help players become more explosive when:

• accelerating to the ball
• changing direction
• pushing out of defensive positions
• serving
• producing force through groundstrokes

This is why strength and power shouldn't be viewed as separate pieces of training.

Strength builds the foundation. Power helps the player use it quickly.

3. Develop Tennis-Specific Speed and Agility

Tennis movement is very different from simply being fast in a straight line.

Players need to accelerate, stop, react, change direction and recover repeatedly.

And they often have to do it while reading the ball and their opponent.

High-performance tennis training should therefore develop tennis-specific speed and agility, not just general running speed.

The goal is to make players more efficient and explosive in the movement patterns they actually use on court.

Players should also learn how to decelerate and control their body effectively. Being able to get to the ball quickly is important, but so is being able to control the position, hit the shot and recover for the next ball.

4. Build Conditioning for Tennis

A player can look fast and powerful early in a match.

The real test is whether they can maintain it.

Tennis requires players to perform repeated high-intensity efforts with short periods of recovery, sometimes for several hours.

That means conditioning needs to prepare players to:

• recover between points
• repeat explosive efforts
• maintain movement quality
• cope with long rallies
• handle long matches
• recover for the next training session or match

Simply going for long runs or doing random hard workouts isn't enough.

Your conditioning should have a purpose and reflect the demands of tennis.

We explain this further in our How to Improve Tennis Conditioning article, particularly why structure and progression matter when building tennis fitness.

5. Don't Ignore Mobility and Movement Quality

You can be strong and fit, but if your body doesn't move well, your performance will eventually be limited.

Tennis asks the body to move through multiple directions, positions and ranges of motion at high speed.

Mobility work can help players access those positions more effectively, while activation and movement preparation help prepare the body to use them.

This becomes particularly important when training loads increase.

More training isn't always the answer.

Sometimes improving how the body moves allows players to get more from the training they are already doing.

Our Move Better on the Tennis Court Without Training Harder article goes deeper into this.

6. Recovery Is Part of High-Performance Training

One of the biggest mistakes ambitious players make is thinking every session needs to be hard.

It doesn't.

High-performance training is about creating the right stimulus and then giving the body an opportunity to adapt to it.

If a player continually adds:

more tennis,
more fitness,
more gym,
more running,
without considering recovery, eventually performance can suffer.

Fatigue accumulates, movement quality drops and injury risk can increase.

We recently covered this in Why Most Tennis Players Train Too Hard (And Still Don't Improve).

The best training plan isn't the one containing the most work.

It's the one that allows the player to keep progressing.

7. Test Before You Guess

This is one of the most important parts of high-performance tennis training.

How do you know what a player needs if you haven't assessed them?

Testing gives you a starting point.

It can help identify strengths and weaknesses and provide objective information that can guide training.

Depending on the player, testing might look at areas such as:

• strength
• mobility
• speed and agility
• aerobic fitness
• repeated-effort capacity

Then you can train.

And later, retest.

Test → Train → Retest.

If you're unsure where your physical level currently sits, our tennis fitness testing can help establish a starting point and identify the areas of your game that may need more attention.

That process helps take the guesswork out of physical preparation.

It also allows players and coaches to see whether the training is actually working.

8. Bring Everything Together With Periodisation

This is where high-performance training becomes very different from simply following workouts.

Strength matters.

Power matters.

Speed matters.

Conditioning matters.

Mobility matters.

Recovery matters.

But you cannot just train everything as hard as possible, all the time.

The components need to work together.

A player's physical training should take into account their tennis practice, matches, tournaments, current physical condition and goals.

There will be times when strength development is a priority.

There will be times when speed and power become more important.

And there will be periods where maintaining physical qualities and staying fresh for competition is the priority.

That's periodisation.

The question isn't just: “What exercises should I do?”

The better question is:

“What does my body need right now, and how does it fit into everything else I'm doing?”

That is how high-performance players should approach off-court training.

What Does a High-Performance Tennis Training Week Look Like?

There is no single weekly schedule that works for every player.

A high-performance player might need strength, power, speed and agility, conditioning, mobility and recovery work across the week, but the amount and timing will depend on their tennis load and competition schedule.

This is why copying another player's training week can be a mistake.

Two players can have the same goal but need completely different workloads.

The training needs to fit the player.

Not the player into the training.

High-Performance Training Isn't About Doing More

This is probably the biggest message we want players to take from this.

High-performance training doesn't mean doing the hardest workout possible every day.

It means knowing:

what to train, why you're training it, when to train it and how it fits into the bigger picture.

When strength, power, speed, agility, conditioning, mobility, recovery and testing are brought together within a structured plan, players have a much clearer pathway for improving their physical performance.

That is what separates training from simply working out.

Ready to Take Your Tennis Fitness to the Next Level?

We recently rebuilt our High Performance Strength & Conditioning Program around these principles.

It is designed for serious tennis players aged 16+ who want a structured approach to developing the physical qualities needed for high-performance tennis.

Rather than guessing what to train each day, players follow a progressive system covering strength, power, speed and agility, conditioning, mobility, recovery and testing.

Explore the High Performance Strength & Conditioning Program 2.0 and see how the training is structured.