Understanding Tennis Agility Exercises

One of the very important components of tennis fitness is agility. People sometimes confuse tennis agility exercises or use it interchangeably with speed. However, there is a difference between the two terms.

Speed refers to how fast a person can move along a straight line. Tennis agility pertains more to how quick a player can get moving from a stationary position, change directions or change speeds. Agility is therefore more closely related to acceleration than velocity.

There are some sports where speed may seem more important than agility and vice versa. Obviously in track sports, speed is most important. In some team sports, agility would seem more useful.

Consider the sport of basketball: it is more difficult to guard against someone who can shift directions very quickly than someone who relies solely on pure speed. The usual case however is that an agile athlete is one that can also run fast, but not every athlete who runs fast is agile.