Up Your Tennis Game with Yoga: It May be Your Secret Weapon

Lawn tennis is a very physical sport which requires great speed and endurance along with short bursts of power and quick reflexes, yoga can help to improve many aspects of your tennis game that you were probably unaware of. Yoga also helps to increase the range of motion of your body and can help to prevent your muscles from losing their elasticity.

Many tennis amateurs and professionals alike play the game with their muscles constantly tense and yoga trains your muscles to be just the opposite, which may prove to be the difference between winning and losing a point, set or match. Muscles must be relaxed before any contraction takes place so having relaxed muscles allows for much faster reaction time compared to stiff, contract muscles.

The breathing techniques that are learned in yoga can help to greatly increase your strength, endurance and stamina by expanding lung capacity and facilitating controlled breathing. Controlled breathing is easy to perform and can help to boost your tennis game, you simply exhale while you are executing a yoga pose until you feel the maximum stretch or resistance of the muscles. You should never hold your breath while doing controlled breathing and as with all exercise techniques, never force your body to do something that it does not want to do. Generally with most yoga poses during controlled breathing exercises, you should hold the pose briefly for approximately 30 seconds and relax your body while breathing slowly and deeply.

The spine twist pose also helps to increase both the range of motion and the flexibility of any tennis player and as such should be practiced daily, along with controlled breathing exercises. To do this pose, you should sit on the floor with both legs placed in front of you, your left leg should be bent with the left foot on your right knee. Your left hand should be placed on the floor (and should be straight and not bent) while your right elbow should be bent and place your right hand against your left hip. You should again exhale slowly while moving your entire upper body to the left. This pose should be held for approximately 30 seconds and repeated for the right side of the body.

To fully gain the benefits that yoga would give to your tennis game, you need to practice your breathing exercises along with your yoga exercises diligently every single day, just like any other exercise routine. It may also allow you to relax and become more calm and relaxed, which may help to improve your focus and concentration during your next tennis game.

References
1. http://ezinearticles.com/?Yoga-for-Great-Tennis&id=112207
2. http://www.usta.com/USTA/Global/Improve_Your_Game/Archive/Health_and_Fitness/Training_and_Exercise/Yoga_and_Pilates.aspx