Fitness Components of Table Tennis

Kevin Long Asked 12 years ago

Hi Alois,

If you had to pick the 5 most important fitness components for table tennis, what would they be and why? What would be the best way to train these components?

Alois Rosario Answered 12 years ago

Hi Kevin,

Table Tennis requires all 5 major components of fitness at the highest level.  You speed, strength, power, endurance and agility.  Speed is understandable because of the speed of the ball and the rallies.

Strength is required so that you can maintain leg positions required during a rally and the ability to get to a ball that is out of reach and moving at 160 km/h.  Power will enable you to jump into position.  Endurance will enable you to keep going through a long tournament.  Some will last a week or more where you are playing 6 to 9 matches in a day at time.

Agility will enable you to reduce injury and stretch to reach balls.

These are just some examples of how Table Tennis requires all areas of fitness and one of the reasons that it is such a popular game.

To cover all of this you need to first embark on a general fitness program.   Later you can start to tailor it more specifically for Table Tennis.  Take a loo at these previous blogs on Weight Training Specifically for Table Tennis and Strength Conditioning for Table Tennis.