Agility Training for You

Agility is the ability to change direction quickly and keep your balance. This is particularly important in racket sports where strength and body control is as important as speed. Not only is it about speed but also grace and the flow of movement.

As with any form of exercise the basis is balance and core strength, and so it is with agility training. Agility training starts as you warm up, the body can be encouraged to move through a greater range of movements with the use of resistant bands, Swiss balls, and step exercises. Over a number of weeks develop a programme to increase the range of movements, the speed of those movements, and the ease in which you are able to achieve those movements.

One form of exercise footballers use to improve their agility is the snake exercise; it can be achieved in the back garden. Set out items of the same size, i.e. cones, in this case you could use buckets or flower pots, at a meter apart and weave through the items from left to right. Repeat this process, in time your muscles will remember the exercise and you will be able to complete it in a shorter time and with less effort. Another form of exercise to use your flower pots for is the rolling start. Set two flower pots at 10-20 meters apart and jog to the first and sprint to the second. This exercise can also be carried by side stepping in a jogging form to the first flower pot and then sprint in side step to the second point. These exercises form a good basis of programming your muscles into different actions without the use of expensive equipment.

Image Credit: WCSC.org