Tag: conditioning

CHANGE OF DIRECTION SPEED is an often overlooked element of movement skills, but it is the most important in racquetball. There are four types of change of direction speed that we’ll work on: side to side, forward and backward, turning and running, and jumping. Now that we have addressed moving faster, let’s talk about moving more efficiently. In this sport, if you move quickly, but not efficiently you will often overrun the ball or jam yourself. This is a major problem since you will not be able to develop consistency, accuracy, or power, leading to frustration. The key factor in

Read More›

POWER is another one of the key elements in conditioning you want to develop for your "Championship Game". Power is represented by speed over time. In other words, how quickly and with what certain force can you move? Or in sports, we think of “explosion” when we think of power. How quickly can you act, react or move with definite force? An example would be an offensive power ‘drive serve” which would be speed with force equaling POWER. There are specific exercises that develop your power and helps you to become more "explosive" into the ball, thus generating more power

Read More›

AGILITY for a racquetball athlete can be most clearly defined as the ability to maneuver your way around the court as you are getting into position to hit the ball as it comes off the wall at different angles, heights, and speeds while having a sense of where your opponent is on the court. We can also call this "being light on your feet" or being "on the balls of your feet", in other words being able to make adjustments "on a dime." If you can relate agility to a football player, it would best be described by a running

Read More›

The techniques and skills of racquetball require five different speed motions: STARTING SPEED: getting up to the highest rate of speed as quickly as possible so you can get into good center court position or have better return of serves. FOOT SPEED: to negotiate balls that are hit at different angles and come off the wall at different angles, speeds and trajectories. HIP SPEED: (or rotation) is often necessary to turn and run as well as used to generate more power which we outlined explicitly in Chapters One and Two, Forehand and Backhand techniques. BACKPEDAL SPEED: is to relocate back

Read More›