Most tennis players spend hours perfecting their serve, dialing in technique, and running drills until their legs fall off—but they’re missing a huge piece of the performance puzzle. Incorporating strength into their regimen. Strength training isn’t just for gym rats or powerlifters. If you play tennis and want to improve your game, if you want to hit harder, move faster, and outlast your opponent deep into a match, you need to train your body like an athlete, not just a tennis player. There are four key concepts that will take your performance to the next level—without wasting time on fluff that doesn’t translate to the court. But before we get into them, let’s talk about the foundation of it all. 

Let’s be clear—nothing replaces investing in a solid program, a seasoned coach and time on the court. The best players in the world didn’t get there by skipping drills or ignoring technique. Serving, volleying, reading your opponent and anticipating their next move—it’s all skill, and it takes reps. But once those foundations are in place, strength training becomes the edge, the missing link if you will. It’s what helps a good player become a dominant one. Because when your body can keep up with your brain, that’s when things start to click.

Physical strength or technical ability are both important on a tennis court, but which one is going to take your game from good to great? The truth is, they’re not competing—they’re complimentary. Technical skill gets you in the game. It’s your form, your footwork, your ability to read the play. But strength? That’s what keeps you sharp in the third set, powers your serve, and helps you explode into position without breaking down. One without the other leaves a gap. If you want to level up, your training needs to support your skill—not just mirror it.

Strength Endurance

Let’s talk about strength endurance—because being strong is great, but being strong for three hours? That’s what separates the weekend warrior from a real competitor. Tennis matches aren’t quick sprints; they’re marathons disguised as sprints. Men can go five full sets, women go three, and if you’re playing in the heat, it gets real brutal, real fast. You need to be just as powerful all the way through, especially in that final set, as you were in the first serve.

Here’s where most players fall apart: they’ve got the skills, maybe even the strength, but they run out of gas. Their footwork slows, their precision starts to slip, and their mental game starts to crack because the body can’t keep up. Strength endurance is about keeping your power output high while under pressure—when your legs are toast, your heart’s racing, and there are still a few more matches to play.

Training isn’t just grinding out long runs (though there’s a time and place for those). Sprint intervals, HIIT workouts, and extended bouts on the bike or rower can help build that base. And if you really want to get gritty—hit the sauna. Yep, sitting in heat a few times a week has been shown to boost endurance, speed up recovery, and help you handle match-day fatigue like a pro.

Bottom line: if you want to show up strong and stay strong from first point to match point, you need to train your endurance like it matters—because it does.

Dynamic Trunk Control (Core Stability)

Most people hear “core training” and think of crunches. But if you want real carryover to the court, we’re talking dynamic trunk control—the kind of core stability that lets you twist, stop, explode, and change direction without falling apart. Think of it like this: your trunk is the command center. If it’s not rock solid, your limbs are just flailing around trying to make magic happen.

Picture Patrick Mahomes dodging a 300-pound lineman and still throwing a perfect spiral across his body—that’s dynamic trunk control in action.  It is the thing that keeps athletes stable while they move fast and unpredictably. And in tennis? That same ability lets you sprint, rotate, decelerate, and smack a forehand without losing balance or overloading your joints.

It also does something subtle but powerful: it quiets all the “excess noise” in your body. When your core is stable, your movements are cleaner. Your shoulders don’t overcompensate. Your shots feel smoother. You’re not wasting energy trying to control your body—you’re actually using it.

To train this, skip the sit-ups and go for explosive, rotational work. Think anti-rotation holds, Russian twists, Hydro Weight throws, and plyometric core drills where you move fast and then slam on the brakes. The goal is to create power through the torso and control it under pressure. Because in the middle of a long rally, it’s not just about how hard you hit—it’s whether you can stay grounded, read the play, and get into position for the next shot.

Strength Training for Agility

If you’ve spent any time around tennis training, you’ve probably seen the good ol’ agility ladder pulled out like it’s the holy grail. Don’t get me wrong—footwork matters. But ladders alone aren’t building the strength or stability you need to actually move better on the court. Agility isn’t just quick feet—it’s how well your body absorbs force, redirects it, and stays in control when everything’s moving fast.

That starts from the ground up. Your glutes, quads, calves, and even your tibialis (yep, that shin muscle everyone ignores) need to be strong and coordinated. When those muscles are trained properly—especially one side at a time—you’re not just faster, you’re more stable, more powerful, and less likely to tweak something when you hit a sudden stop or shift.

Unilateral strength is the missing link here. Things like single-leg squats, Cossack squats, step-ups, and walking lunges build the kind of balance and strength that shows up when you’re reaching for a wide shot or pushing off into a sprint. Add in power-based movements like power cleans, hang snatches, trap bar jumps, and dumbbell snatches, and now you’ve got a body that doesn’t just move fast—it reacts fast.

Agility isn’t a drill. It’s a full-body skill built in the weight room. The more strength you build into your foundation, the more freedom and control you’ll have on the court.

Impulse Training

Everyone talks about power—but the real game-changer? Impulse. It’s not just how much force you can produce, it’s how fast you can produce it. On the court, you’ve got fractions of a second to react, shift, and strike. If you can’t generate force quickly, you’re already a step behind.

Impulse is what helps you plant, pivot, and rip a return shot before your opponent even finishes their follow-through. It’s what gets you across the baseline for that dink shot and back into position without skipping a beat. If you want to be one or two steps ahead, this is the edge you train for.

And it’s not just about going so hard—it’s about responding as fast as possible. That means plyometrics and Olympic lifts with commands, so your body gets used to reacting in real time. Think power snatches when you hear “go,” or split jumps when the direction changes on a dime. Mix in reactive agility drills where you don’t know what’s coming next, and now you’re training your nervous system, not just your muscles.

Bottom line: impulse is how you turn strength into speed, and speed into domination. The faster you can fire, the faster you can win

5 exercises to do inside the gym

1. Split Squats (Front-Foot or Rear-Foot Elevated)

Split squats are a must for tennis players. This unilateral movement builds single-leg strength, improves balance, and helps you stay stable when you're lunging, pivoting, or reacting to a wide shot. You’re not just training your legs—you’re building control under pressure, which is exactly what the court demands.

2. Rotational Medicine Ball Slams or Throws

Tennis is all about rotation, and med ball work trains you to be explosive through your core. Slams or throws build power and reinforce that twist-decelerate pattern you use in every swing. Want a stronger serve or a snappier forehand? Start here.

3. Power Snatches or Dumbbell Snatches

The power snatch is where you train impulse—your ability to create power fast. These explosive lifts teach your body to react and fire with speed, which shows up in how quickly you can move, cut, and recover between shots. Add a “go” command and now you're training reaction time, too.

4. Trap Bar Jumps

Trap bar jumps are one of the safest and most effective ways to build total-body explosiveness. They help you produce more force in less time—exactly what you need when you’re sprinting for a drop shot or pushing off the baseline to return a serve.

5. Lateral Step-Ups or Cossack Squats

Tennis isn’t a straight-line sport, so you need to train in the lateral plane. Step up and lunge variation like lateral step ups or cossack squats strengthen your hips, glutes, and adductors while improving flexibility and control. They also mimic real tennis movement patterns, making them super functional.

Conclusion

You don’t need a fancy training plan or flashy drills to level up your game—you need strength that actually translates to the court. When you build endurance that holds up under pressure, core control that keeps you grounded, agility that moves with purpose, and explosive power that fires on demand, you stop just playing tennis and start dominating it. These concepts aren’t just for pros—they’re for any player who’s tired of feeling stuck and ready to show up stronger, faster, and more confident every time they step on the court.