Low-Compression Tennis: Rally in Threes with Rotation

A tennis warm-up in groups of three using low-compression balls, which bounce lower and travel slower. Students can rally from minute one and warm up their whole body with real footwork.

How to play

1. Racket mobility: trunk rotations, lunges with the racket overhead and side skips (2 min).
2. Solo ball control: bounces up and down, switching racket faces (2 min).
3. Rally in threes: two players rally over a low net; the third waits behind and steps in as soon as one hits, who then jogs to the back of the line (4 min).
4. Directed rally: the player stepping in must send the ball to the cone the waiting player points to (4 min).

Rules

• When leaving the court, always go around behind the hitter, never in front.
• Cooperative rally: the trio counts consecutive hits.
• One ball per trio; extras stay at each court's cone.

Variations

Adaptations

• Limited mobility: play from a wheelchair with the two-bounce rule and no rotating; the others rotate around them.
• Deaf or hard of hearing: task changes are shown by holding up a colored cone, not by whistle.
• Sore shoulder or elbow: short strokes at mid-court with the non-dominant hand, or act as the feeder.

Learning goals

• Warm up the body with tennis footwork and strokes.
• Keep a cooperative rally going by controlling power.
• Run rotations smoothly without wasting time.

Equipment for a class of 25

• tennis rackets: 30
• low-compression tennis balls: 15
• cones: 20
• badminton net: 2

Teacher tip

Red or orange stage balls are cheap and last for years; if you have none, let some air out of old balls by poking them with a needle. A badminton net lowered to 1 m or a rope between two posts works as a net.

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