Squash is an intense physical challenge that demands balance between power and precision. Physical endurance is of vital importance in order to stay on court for an extended match.
To improve endurance, incorporate aerobic exercises such as running and cycling into your routine as well as high-intensity interval training (HIIT) comprising 30 second sprints followed by 30 second recovery periods. You can also increase muscle strength through plyometric and explosive training drills.
Jump Squats
If your bodyweight workouts have become boring and repetitive, incorporate jump squats into your routine to amp up its intensity and add some explosive power and athleticism. Jump squats differ from air squats by loading more weight onto the heel rather than front of each foot during its lowest point; therefore, this exercise should only be introduced once you are adept with air squats.
This plyometric exercise works a variety of lower body and core muscles simultaneously. Not only is the Squat Jump beneficial in targeting quads, glutes and hamstrings but it also engages calves using soleus and gastrocnemius muscles for pushing off from the ground during jumping – it requires core stabilization during an explosive phase for balance and posture maintenance during such movements!
Athleticians should begin by warming up with light jogging or high intensity intervals before proceeding with these exercises. This drill is useful for athletes of any sport seeking to improve their speed, agility and athleticism–especially those involved in sports that involve sprinting. Studies have demonstrated that plyometric exercises like jump squats can enhance sprint performance by strengthening leg muscles and increasing power.
Aside from adding explosiveness, tuck jump can also improve speed by training legs to accelerate quickly – an invaluable skill in any sport. Therefore, this exercise makes an excellent drill when used alongside others such as box jump or medicine ball throw exercises.
For maximum effectiveness, practice this drill on either a hard court or with soft landing surfaces to reduce impact on knees and hips. Care must be taken when landing softly as failing to do so could injure knees and ankles if not done carefully enough; to protect yourself make sure to land on toes/balls of feet/and bend knees for cushioned landing.
Box Jumps
Box Jumps can add explosive power to your training program. Although they can be difficult for novices, focusing on proper technique will ensure not only reaping all the benefits (more power output and improved jumping ability) but avoiding injuries like shin scrapes or lower extremity fractures. Beginners should begin on lower platforms until ready for higher platforms – just keep track of your progress so you know when it is time for another challenge!
Stand in an athletic stance with feet hip-distance apart and slightly bent knees and hips to provide a solid base for jumping. Once in position, drive yourself forward by pressing on the balls of your feet as a means of propulsion into the air, swinging arms as you do so. At the height of your jump, explode up onto the box while landing softly; aim to land first on balls of feet then heels for optimal control upon touchdown.
An advanced variant of the box jump is to perform a “double-leg” variation, wherein each leg clears one barrier at a time before switching over for each subsequent barrier. This drill adds extra intensity while improving foot speed, agility, ankle stability and vertical and horizontal jumping capacity of athletes.
This exercise is ideal for developing lower body strength, specifically glutes and hamstrings, while simultaneously strengthening upper-body and core. By performing this routine regularly, it will build your strength foundation before progressing onto more challenging exercises that can really make an impactful difference in your squash game.
Before diving headfirst into box jumps for the first time, it’s essential that you add lower-key plyometric drills such as jumping rope and skipping into your workout routines for several weeks beforehand. This will allow your muscles to become used to the explosive movements associated with this exercise and reduces risk of injuries like shin scrapes and ACL tears.
Medicine Ball Throws
Med ball throws are an ideal way to develop explosive power in the lower body, core and upper back. In addition, they challenge balance while adding some ‘fun’ into workouts. To start throwing medicine balls at walls with ease, find a wall near you, take two big steps forward then hold both medicine balls tightly before throwing against the wall as hard as you can until they hit. Catch your throw then reset for another rep.
These exercises offer many advantages, not the least of which being adaptable to any level of fitness. Beginners may begin with lighter medicine balls before gradually progressing up to heavier ones as their strength and endurance increase.
Medicine balls have long been used as part of high-level training programs. Convenient to store and compact for transporting purposes, medicine balls provide versatile ways of developing speed, power and agility in athletes. Unfortunately, most research on medicine ball training lacks sufficient detail for meaningful conclusions to be drawn; moreover they’re usually too lightweight to provide mechanical overload to most sports actions.
As such, medicine ball training often gets overlooked for more sport specific and dynamic drills. But its benefits can be significant when included as part of an overall program of sport-specific training, dynamic and static movement patterns, plyometrics and strength and conditioning training.
Plyometric exercises can help to develop the power needed for high-speed sprinting movements in squash. A set of squat jumps wherein feet are set hip distance apart and the player jumps forwards, sideways, and diagonally is an effective drill that enhances range of motion in ankles and shoulders while strengthening both eccentric and concentric power for explosive movements.
Lunges
Perform lunges as an effective way of improving balance and stability when playing squash. By training one leg at a time in isolation, lunges enable core and glute muscles to stabilize hips more effectively – helping reduce lower back pain while increasing posture, coordination and balance. Furthermore, this drill helps develop fast footwork patterns to enable players to enter/exit courts more rapidly without being controlled or nudged out of position by an opponent.
Maintaining explosive power throughout a lengthy squash match requires high cardiovascular endurance. This can be improved through both steady state cardio such as running or cycling and short bursts of high intensity exercise like sprinting or HIIT training, which should all help.
As squash players often need to sprint over longer distances than other sports, athletes can work on this aspect of their game by increasing the repetitions and volume of sprint-based exercises in each workout session. However, these workouts must be planned carefully so as to not cause excessive fatigue or injury to athletes.
Lunging over long distances requires the athlete to perform dynamic trunk flexion in order to produce force at both knees and ankles, creating force at those joints. This movement pattern can often be found in squash where players must combine explosive lunging with dynamic knee extension to produce high initial impact forces.
Experienced players can improve their ability to reduce impact loading forces by adopting an approach combining dynamic lunging and knee extension to promote greater force control (13). Their progress in doing this can be assessed using an validated movement screening tool like the Y Balance Test which assesses dynamic balance safely and functionally (12).
This drill was originally developed for elite squash players; however, other athletes can easily adapt it by changing the number of barriers, their height or distance between hops. Furthermore, you could break this session down into its core movements so an athlete could focus on specific aspects or movement patterns such as volleying or turning.