For tennis, circuit training is a great way to include all of the fitness components you need to improve in the one session. By learning how to plan a session you will be able to maximise the time you have available to fit in your tennis and your training.
Get fit to play, don’t play to get fit is a very well known saying and you should all know that doing some fitness work along side your lessons and practise sessions will improve your performance as well as making you less prone to injury.
Well, if you are looking for the perfect way to train all the components of fitness you need to improve your game in the same session, then you need look no further than circuit training.
Circuit training is an exercise format that normally utilises between 6 and 10 exercises that are completed one after another (the circuit!!) for a specified number of repetitions or time period before moving onto the next exercise. The completion of one exercise and the beginning of the next are separated by brief timed rest intervals and each circuit by a longer rest period. The total number of circuits performed during a training session may vary from two to six depending on your training level (beginner, intermediate, or advanced), your period of training and your training objective.
To plan a Session you will need to think about the possible exercises that can be performed with the equipment and space you have available. In order to ensure that no two consecutive exercises stress the same muscle group set up the circuit as follows:
Total-body, Upper-body, Lower-body, Core/Trunk etc.
It is important to warm up and perform some dynamic stretching exercises and to repeat this as a cool down after the session.
Example No Equipment Circuit Training Session
Skipping – cardiovascular & coordination
Press ups - chest, shoulders, arms (esp triceps - serve) and core
Squats – quads, glutes, hamstrings, calves and core/lower back
Crunch – abdominals esp rectus abdominis
Star Jumps – leg power, flexibility & endurance
Bench Dips – triceps, chest and shoulders
Lunges – hamstrings, glutes and quads
Back extension – lower back
Shuttle runs (sprinting/running continuously between predetermined points) – speed endurance
Duration – start with the following (lower level): 20 seconds work on each exercise with a 30 second recovery between each exercise - 3 sets with a 3 minute recovery between each circuit
Complete the circuit training session twice a week with at least 48 hours between each session. I suggest you base your training on a four week cycle of an easy week, medium week, hard week and test/recovery week.
The work load can be varied by changing the number of exercises, duration, sets or repetitions.
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