Regardless to whether you are an amateur playing for fun or a world class professional tennis player, you always want to show your best tennis. Since everything should be done according to the plan or schedule, to achieve best results you need to set goals. Goal setting would include both on-court and off-court exercises, strict diet and mental training. To achieve peak performance you need to optimal in all of these fields. Once you get behind in at least one of them, you will mess up next match. For this reason you need to set your goals and strategically plan the way to achieve them. Here is a short step-by-step instruction on how to do this.

Step 1

Take a look at how you do, estimate all aspects of your play and locate and note your weak sides whether it is serve, down shots, disability to handle long volleys, net points or drop shots.

Step 2

Make a list and write down all the areas requiring immediate response to be improved. Then give it to your coach if you have one, or start working on the weaknesses on your own one by one. Do not skip any of the weak side unless you are good at it. If you have a poor forehand or unable to spin the down ball, you need to spend some time and pay attend the problem.

Step 3

If there is a rush before the match coming up in a few days, and your list is rather long, prioritize the issues to be resolved choosing the most frequently used ones during the match so you will lose fewer points. Escalated issues will require constant attention. Also you can sort them according to the estimated time frame required to improve the shot or serve.

Step 4

Whether some of your issues would require additional payments for gym or personal physical trainer, set up your budget. Once again, if there is not so much time left before the up-coming match that you are a little bit anxious of, there is no need spending a lot of money on expensive training as most skills are general and your regular tennis coach will be able to sort them out with you.

Step 5

Set up a long-term training plan including the schedule for improvements you wish to do or goals you wish to achieve. For example, if you wish to improve your breathing and be able to run 2 miles in 12 minutes you need to be running 6 days a week in the morning apart from regular on-court training to improve your lungs efficiency. This is only one short example of the goal that may be yours. Whether you wish to grow several inches or lose some pounds, you need to clearly set up the schedule and never call ongoing training off, otherwise you will step away from the plan.

Doing this simple five steps should help you organize your life as well as have your training scheduled to make your body get used to it. It is also recommended that you keep all the records of your achievements in your diary or journal.