In a previous post, I outlined the physical demands during tennis play and briefly explained how these demands can be addressed through strength training. At this point, many coaches believe it's time to start programming. Well…almost. Before you can begin putting a plan together, you must determine the specific needs of your athlete. This is generally done through various means, including - but not limited to - testing, questionnaires, conversation, observation, tracking and so on. This article will focus on physical testing as it relates to tennis play. 

Over the years I’ve done some trial & error using a variety of tests for tennis players and I've realized that fewer tests performed more frequently works best for me. The data becomes more meaningful both to develop a program and to track progress. That’s why I’ve narrowed the list down to what I’ve personally determined to be the most relevant tests for tennis players. I'm not saying there aren’t other tests that can be used, I’ve just noticed that these work well. Why? Two main reasons - first, they’re pretty easy to administer and replicate and second, their inherent nature spurs competition amongst athletes - something I try to instil in all my athletes. Here are the relevant athletic qualities (with tests to follow):

1. Maximum Strength (both lower body and upper body)
2. Rate of Force Development (aka Explosiveness)
3. Acceleration
4. Maximum Speed
5. Agility/Change-of-Direction
6. Power
7. Endurance

Before we move on, a quick note on why it’s important to test your athletes. We all agree that modern tennis requires explosive movements but what if our athlete already possesses explosive abilities? Should we continue working on this quality? The answer is yes and no. Yes, we should continue prescribing drills that will maintain this quality - and in certain periods, enhance this quality - and no we shouldn't emphasize this quality over other, weaker ones. For example, I had an athlete who had a vertical jump of over 35” - he was 17. Now that’s pretty good for a basketball player, where jump height is a critical performance metric, let alone a tennis player. The problem...he was weak. Why is this a problem? Often times when an athlete is very ‘springy’, for lack of a better term, certain tissues aren’t able to withstand the constant stop and start nature of tennis. This is compounded during repetitive movements - further enhancing injury risk. In this case, my athlete did in fact have a history of lower body injuries. 

In the above example, an emphasis on heavier strength training could help this athlete not only decrease his chance of injury, but could even enhance his initially high explosive abilities. Double bonus. But we won’t know until we determine his strengths and weaknesses, through testing. With advances in technology, many coaches have abandoned good old fashion testing. But in my opinion, it’s the simplest (and most affordable) way to get insight into your athlete. 

Physical Tests for Tennis Players

Athletic Quality 1 - Max Strength 

A mentor of mine once told me that every sport requires a certain amount of maximum strength (and therefore max strength training). It’s obviously more apparent in a sport like american football versus a sport like tennis, but nonetheless, important for both. To measure max strength, we must perform 1 repetition maximum (1RM) tests with exercises that in some form correspond to the needs of a tennis player (which coincidentally, are similar movements to many other field/court sports): 

1RM Testing

Lower-Body Max Strength

1. Back Squat
2. Deadlift (can be used as an alternative)

Upper-Body Max Strength

1. Overhead Press 
2. Pull-Up

We’ll use the back squat to provide an example of a 1RM test (can be modified for each lift):

1. Perform a few warm-up sets with an empty bar (i.e. just the bar)
2. Add 5-10kg/side and perform 10 reps (this can be more OR less depending on the level of your athlete, but for cautionary reasons we’ll keep the load low)
3. After a suitable rest, add another 5-10kg per side and drop the reps to 8
4. Rest again and add another 5-10kg per side and drop the reps to ~5
5. Continue this process of adding weight and lowering the reps until the athlete can only perform 1 rep at a particular load. 

I know what you may be thinking “my athletes are too young (or too inexperienced or too whatever) for 1RM testing”. In the past, I thought exactly the same way until until a colleague of mine filled me in on a secret....everyone has a 1RM - that is, the ability to perform 1 rep with maximum load with their current abilities. Current abilities include technical proficiency of the lift and mental will. If you’re a beginner, you may not have the technique of a more advanced athlete and you definitely won’t have the mental capacity to push yourself to a true 1RM BUT you still have a 1RM despite these current inadequacies. You may only be able to perform 1 solid rep with 30kg on your back, and that’s fine, it’s a starting point. This is where the coach must assess at what point to stop the athlete. 

One final point on this topic - if your athletes are regularly training max strength, you probably don’t need to perform a 1RM test as the training itself acts as a recurring 1RM test. And as legendary coach Vern Gambetta once said, "training is testing and testing is training". In fact, All these tests can be incorporated into a training session and therefore act as training. 

Athletic Quality 2 - Rate of Force Development (RFD)

In layman’s terms, RFD stands for explosiveness. No need to argue if this is a necessary quality for tennis players (or any athlete for that matter). What’s important here is to distinguish between 2 types of explosiveness; explosive strength and starting strength. 

Explosive Strength

This is related to power (and as we know, power has time component). In other words, can you generate the necessary force in the given time frame required to complete the task at hand. For example, your opponent hits a big return off your second serve which forces you to move laterally to your backhand. Do you have the explosive ability to get to the ball on time? 

Starting Strength

Starting strength is related to explosive strength but the time frame is shorter and is therefore more specific to the initiation of the movement. In the case of tennis, it can be interchangeable with reactive strength - the ability to develop that initial burst to kickstart the movement. Starting/reactive strength is perhaps one of the most important determinant’s of highly efficient movers on the tennis court. Check out this post for more on this movement quality. 

Generally, you’ll need some tech to be able to get this info - i.e. force/time. Practically, force platforms, linear position transducers, motion capture systems etc. are too expensive and cumbersome to use. Recently, low cost, user-friendly technologies have enabled coaches to have access to these metrics. That said, there are ways to get indirect feedback for RFD, and all you’ll need is a stopwatch. I use a drop jump test and I use time as my performance metric. This is something I've been experimenting with and seems to do the trick. You won't get any force metrics but you will have time feedback. This test provides insight into the initiation of movement when landing from a box (starting strength) and explosiveness when jumping onto another box (explosive strength). 

RFD - Drop Jump Test

1. Set up 2 boxes - one at 12 inches, the other at 18inches.**
2. The athlete will begin on the lower box. The athlete will then step/drop off the box. 
3. As soon as the athlete’s feet touch the ground, the coach hits start on the stopwatch. 
4. As soon as the athlete jumps onto the higher box, the coach presses stop. 

Perform several of these as you must have a good eye to get some sort of reliable, accurate data. The goal is for your athlete to minimize the time between contact with the ground and landing on the box. This isn’t the most ideal test, but it works. 

**I’ve experimented with the heights and these seem to work best - i.e. the drop isn’t too deep that the athlete gets crushed by it and the jump isn’t too high that the athlete fears missing it. 

Athletic Quality 3 - Acceleration

When it comes to tennis, acceleration is more important than speed. This is the case because during tennis play you'll rarely move more than 3 metres or so when tracking down an opponent's shot. The direct opposite quality to acceleration is deceleration. Although deceleration is important, when testing for agility you'll indirectly assess it. 

10m Acceleration Test

1. Set up 2 sets of cones, one at the starting line and the other at the finish line. 

2. When the coach says “GO”, the athlete sprints full out, decelerating ONLY after he/she crosses the finish line. 

When going through these tests, it’s important to perform an adequate warm-up while also giving the athletes a few ‘practice’ attempts. I often allow for few trials runs and record the results anyway (sometimes without them knowing - or I tell them I’m getting my stopwatch timing in sync). I’ve noticed that they’ll have better results when the pressure is mitigated. You’ll want to give them at least 3 trials and then average them out to minimize testing error. 

In the next post, we'll take a look at the remaining tests and outline their importance.