Now that you’re aware of the importance of balance in tennis and how it is actually crucial for your ability to control the ball well, let’s see in what ways you can improve your balance and work on it in very practical ways.
Balance and stability help improve ball control because of a very interesting connection between the stability of the foot and the stability of the wrist.
Skilled tennis players are consciously or subconsciously aware of this connection and are always looking to stabilize before the stroke (if they can) in order to stabilize their whole body and eventually the wrist in order to keep the racket head steady at the moment of contact.
Stabilizing well on the ground before and during the stroke gives you better control of the stroke,
The foot is of course not always staying on the ground as the game of tennis is too dynamic for players to be able to do that.
But foot firmly on the ground throughout the stroke is the FUNDAMENTAL technique of balancing and stabilizing yourself and it has to be acquired first before progressing to more dynamic ways of balancing yourself while playing tennis.
Drill #1: Drop Feed The Ball And Hold Balance
The first drill for improving your balance in tennis is to just drop feed the ball to yourself, hit it and maintain balance for a couple of seconds.
Do not pay much attention to the ball, but pay attention to how stable you feel on the ground and how the weight is distributed on your foot.
If you’re falling off slightly to any side, you’ve lost balance.
On easy balls like this, you should be able to stay on the spot, stabilizing on the foot/leg that is used mostly for the stroke.
If you play a neutral stance forehand and you’re a right-hander, then you stabilize on the left leg that is in front.
I suggest you try the neutral and open stance for both the forehand and the backhand groundstroke and observe how stable you feel in each situation.
You can find a more detailed demonstration of a forehand drill in a recent article.
Drill #2: Hold Balance Until The End Of The Follow-Through While You Rally
The next progression of improving your balance in tennis is done while you rally cooperatively with a partner.
Your goal is to maintain your balance/position until you complete the follow-through.
Higher skilled tennis players do this automatically without really being conscious of it because they feel that controlling their balance and body movement in space allows them to control the ball better.
You may feel at first that there is not enough time to hold your position for a second longer, but you will soon realize that that’s not true.
The sensation of not having enough time usually comes from playing competitive tennis all the time and being rushed and jerked around by your opponent.
Once you settle down in a nice cooperative rally with your partner, you’ll see that there is more than enough time to pay attention to balance at the end of each stroke.
Observe the pros in their warm-ups and note how long they maintain balance in relation to their follow-through.
Here’s a wonderful demonstration by Roger Federer of how to practice and reinforce good balance every single time you warm up for a tennis lesson.
Do NOT look at his racket or stroke technique, look at his feet!
Drill #3: Learning To Plant Your Foot Well
If you want to balance well on one foot, which is necessary in the game of tennis, then it’s very important that you plant that foot firmly on the ground.
You will be stable only if you plant your foot correctly on the ground.
There is a special technique for this in tennis, and you can develop this technique as well as gain more awareness of how to do it right with this simple drill.
Take a softer tennis ball and put it on the ground. Step on it and position your shoe so that the ball is in the middle of the front half of the shoe – that is, in the middle of the ball of the foot.
Choke up on the grip of your racket so that your attention will not be on your hands and stroke technique but rather on your feet and legs.
Be careful with this drill at first so that you don't twist your ankle. Perform the drill very slowly at first.
Squash the ball by pressing on it and simulate your stroke gently. You do not need to exactly execute your stroke technique because that’s not the focus on the exercise.
Very important – keep your heel on the ground!
If your heel gets off the ground, you will lose balance.
When we plant the foot down in an actual tennis game, we need to put the heel down first and then place the rest of the foot down. The foot needs to stay on the ground if we are positioned well on the ball.
Practice applying pressure on the ball and simulating your stroke repeatedly for about 30 seconds. Then, remove the ball and execute the stroke normally with your foot on the ground.
Note if there’s any difference in your awareness of the foot on the ground and if there’s any difference in how stable you feel on the ground.
Since you have removed the ball, imagine squashing down the rubber sole of your tennis shoe.
Apply force down to the ground.
If you do it right in a springy fashion, you will feel the upward force from the ground as Newton’s third law explains.
Apply this drill to neutral and open stance forehands and backhands during practice 2-3 times per week.
I am quite certain you will have a different awareness and ability to stabilize yourself after even a week or two of practicing.
Drill #4: Balancing On The BOSU Ball
The BOSU ball is a very good training aid for improving balance and performing other exercises especially for improving your core strength.
Similar to the exercises on a soft ball from drill #3, you can practice your groundstrokes on each leg standing on the BOSU ball.
Observe carefully how I demonstrate in the video above. Practice this drill in the gym if you have the opportunity.
Drills #3 and #4 help you improve proprioception which is your sense of self-movement and body position.
If you want to go deeper into this topic and then check these simple proprioception drills and a more scientific look into ankle proprioception and relation to balance and performance in sports.
Drills #5: Go Pro – The Higher Level Balance Training By The Tennis Pros
If you want to work on your balance on an even higher level, then you’ll have to hire a conditioning coach and have them design specific balance exercises for tennis.
You may not be aware of how much emphasis the tennis pros and their teams put on balance, so I deliberately wanted to show you a few video clips of what’s being done on the pro tour.
To see tennis-specific balance training, I recommend these YouTube videos / channels from Duglas Cordero, especially the drills with Fabio Fognini:
Check out the Better Bodies Tennis Factory channel, where there are short video clips from training sessions of the pros, including some balance training.
I hope that these videos give you some insight into the importance of balance in tennis as was my intention with this video article.
In summary, I believe balance is the most important fundamental of tennis groundstrokes, and I always correct balance first, especially when working with an adult recreational tennis player.
In almost all cases, players control the ball much better with no changes to their stroke technique (which is difficult to change in a short amount of time!) just because they balance better while executing their strokes.
After the player gets more awareness of their balance and is stabilizing better before and during every groundstroke, we can progress to correcting other elements of their strokes.
As usual, very clear and insightful – thank you!..
These drills are awesome, and will complement the “No Thought Bio-Mechanics Drills” (purchased from Feel Tennis) which have worked wonders on my backhand.
Great, and thanks for the feedback on the No-Thought video course!
Thank you Tomaz for your advice and insights here. All very helpful for me. I especially like the exercise for the foot using a soft tennis ball. I just tried it in my kitchen, and I see the difference very quickly.
You’re welcome, Mike!
Yes, the soft ball drill can work in a matter of minutes.
It gives the player a new awareness of the stability of the foot which is the key to calming down the body from previous movement and allowing us to control the racket head and therefore the ball.
Superb. Clear, varied and with an outline for what to do on your own.
Again, you found one of my major issues remotely. How do you know? I’ve been practicing better balance since the last issue, and my strokes are much more consistent. Thanks!
Sir is it necessary to always land on the heel first because as per human movement some people land on heel while some can land on the midfoot first or even on the balls of foot,so should we practicing tennis with heel first landing or should it be intuitive?
Also,the pivot can happen on the heel as well as the balls of the foot right ,which would be better for tennis Sir or any of the options are fine?
Thanks again for the amazing articles and videos you share with the community Sir, I’m always indebted & grateful to you for your teachings as you are the only one I trust with insights for the right improvement and knowledge of tennis.
Hi Tarun,
I am demonstrating and explaining the fundamentals of tennis, balance and footwork.
EVERY skilled tennis player places the whole foot on the ground in warm ups and whenever they can position well.
The only situation when a player would not place the heel down is if they are still in movement when they are hitting the ball, meaning they are in trouble or perhaps rushing to the net.
So it’s important for you to differentiate between fundamentals and improvisations when you observe the pros and the footwork.
The improvisations will take care of themselves subconsciously as you play tennis but in my experience, 90% of the recreational tennis players DO NOT execute balance fundamentals with the foot / heel on the ground well.
As for the pivot, it doesn’t happen on the heel with toes up because that would suggest leaning backwards and losing balance.
Terrific insights, great explanations and excellent practical advice to improve my balance on/after ball contact. Thank you Tomaz. It’s very helpful to watching this alongside (purchased) forehand and backhand courses.
Thanks for commenting, Michael!
Balance is one of those boring topics in tennis that no one really cares about but it’s the foundation of power and ball control.
Of course, one only realizes that fully once they improve their balance.