Off-Season Training for In-Season Performance

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This is an article I wrote for a sports publication that is set to go out over the summer.  Even though it is not tennis-specific its worth a read…

“The more you sweat in times of peace, the less you bleed in times of war,” is a saying that is certainly full of wisdom. Training in the off-season is one area where athletes can get a tremendous bang for their buck. This article aims to provide wisdom, based on knowledge and experience, for training in the off-season.

Coach & Mrs. Slezak's Home Gym

Coach & Mrs. Slezak’s Home Gym

Before we get into specifics we have to define what the off-season actually is. The off-season is a period of time when an athlete is not participating competitively in their sport. Team sports like football, basketball, and baseball have a clearly defined off-season. Other sports, such as tennis, have a much harder time defining one. And with the oftentimes overly intense youth sports industry, many young athletes jump from travel to all-star and then varsity high school teams hoping to get ahead and never actually have any off-season.

It is critical for all athletes, professional to youth, to have some sort of off-season built into the year. Playing sports at competitive maximums is taxing on the human body. It does not take much searching to find a sharp increase in overuse injuries for young athletes recently. High school pitchers having Tommy John’s elbow surgery, tennis players with wrist and rotator cuff issues, and knee/ankle problems from the stress of jumping and landing 100+ times on the basketball or volleyball court. It is common sense, you cannot race a car hard every single day at the track without something eventually breaking down and the human body is the same way.

If you cannot play your sport in the off-season then what can you do? First, I am not going to tell you that you cannot play your sport in the off-season. What I will tell you is that you should not be competing in your sport in the off-season. In fact, competing in your sport is the definition of being in-season. This downtime is an opportunity to perform technical skill work or practice but at a much lower intensity and volume then during your competitive season. For example, this would be the time a basketball player could improve dribbling skills or a tennis player technical stroke work. The key take away here is you are not playing your sport at competitive max or “racing speed.”

The off-season is also the time to improve foundational movement patterns, general strength and conditioning. In fact, this should be the bulk of the work done in the off-season. This work done in the off-season builds the base for the future. Improving fundamental movement patterns like squatting, hinging at the hip, pushing, and pulling all improve overall athleticism. The conditioning work done to the aerobic system in the off-season provides the base for the higher-intensity demands to come in the pre and competitive seasons. The improvement of general strength will allow for the athlete to sprint faster, jump higher, and throw harder during the competitive season. You simply cannot build these qualities in the middle of a competitive season. You must build these qualities in the off-season so they can be expressed during the competitive season.

Each sport and athlete has specific needs and if you are serious about getting the most out of the off-season time I would hire a knowledgeable and experienced trainer. The gold-standard for anyone working with youth is to be certified by the International Youth Conditioning Association (IYCA) but the bottom line is do your homework and find someone who thinks long-term and has your best interest in mind. With that being said in a 6-8 week off-season 3 of the most common goals are to develop the aerobic energy system, improve general strength, and clean up fundamental movement patterns.

Regardless of the sport a well-conditioned aerobic system is essential. Obviously a well-conditioned aerobic system will benefit someone like a distance runner or soccer player. However, what most people do not understand is that a fine-tuned aerobic system provides benefits in almost all sports. This is because the aerobic system (energy with oxygen) is responsible for replenishing the fuel for the anaerobic energy system (energy without oxygen). That means football and tennis players need their aerobic system to replenish the anaerobic systems that allow them to perform bursts of high-intensity performance intervals. This is a tremendous advantage late in the game during the competitive season and it can only be accomplished by doing some work dedicated to improving the ability of the lungs, heart and circulatory system to deliver oxygen to working muscle.

Anyone Serious About Training Needs a Heart Rate Monitor

Anyone Serious About Training Needs a Heart Rate Monitor

Another benefit of aerobic training in the off-season, which would include long runs, swimming, or biking at a heart rate of 130-150 beats per minute, is that it promotes recovery. Delivering oxygen rich blood throughout the body aids in rebuilding tissues that take a beating during the competitive season. In addition, it is relatively easy on the nervous system. The nervous system takes a beating during the competitive season with all the quick movements and maximal muscle contractions and aerobic training gives it time to de-load and recover.

The off-season is also the time to lift heavy things and put on some muscle mass. The force a muscle is able to produce is directly related to its cross-sectional size. If you want to be able to run, jump, and throw harder next season then strength training is essential. Strength training simply means you are going to stress the muscle by lifting something heavy and your body will respond by making it bigger and stronger. An athlete does not have to go to the weight room or have access to fancy equipment to strength train. In fact, for most youth athletes bodyweight is the best place to start. After all if you cannot move your own body weight appropriately adding 50lbs on top of your back is asking for an injury.

When strength training the focus should be on movement patterns not on specific muscles. For example, you want to improve strength in fundamental movement patterns such as squatting, hip hinging, pushing, pulling, and core stability. This is easily done with body weight, free weights, sandbags, and resistance bands. It is not easily done with the machines you find in most gyms that isolate specific muscles and joints.

Building a solid foundation of strength in the off-season is then followed up with learning how to expressing that new found strength during the pre-season and then fully in the competitive season. The key here is to understand that to focus on improving general strength in the off-season and then working during the pre and competitive season to apply it.

Figure 1 - Pyramid of Athletic Development

Figure 1 – Pyramid of Athletic Development

The final objective of the off-season is to clean up fundamental movement patterns. This is the time to make sure you can squat fully, hip hinge correctly, and have good posture. This aspect of training is becoming even more important in today’s society. Think about the amount of time children spend sitting on the computer, texting on their phone, and sitting in classrooms. It is causing an epidemic of bad posture and moving in those compromised positions or even worse training and competing in them is a major contributing factor to youth sports injuries such as spondylolysis (stress fracture in the lower back) and shoulder injuries. It is common sense, when you spend all day hunched over and your lower back is in excessive curvature you develop poor posture as your default. Look at the pyramid of athletic development (figure 1) and it is clear to see the base for all of sport is movement. You cannot layer fitness and sports skills on top of dysfunctional movement without eventually paying the price.

It is impossible to prescribe a general workout for the off-season because the needs of each athlete and sport are unique. Some athletes may need to spend more time on developing strength and others improving conditioning. However, below is a very general yet insightful look at the typical week of training in the off-season. Planning training or periodization is a science in and of itself, but one of the biggest things to notice below is how the training is spaced out. An athlete cannot work hard 3 or 4 days in a row and then take 3 or 4 days off. Training is nothing more than applying stress to the body. The body then adapts to the stresses placed on it during rest and recovery. The real physical changes happen between workouts, not during them. Understanding the importance of rest and proper nutrition between workouts will maximize success and allow you to train both hard and smart.

Sample Week of Off-Season Training

Sample Week of Off-Season Training

If you look at everything I presented about off-season training and put it in the context of the bigger picture it becomes clear how important it is when thinking long-term. If you understand that, then I will let you in on a little secret about developing champion athletes. Most parents and coaches are only concerned with the short-term. They want to win the big game next week, the tournament this weekend, or make the U12 all-star soccer team. They may achieve those things but they take shortcuts to get them, such as skipping the off-season. Those shortcuts eventually catch up. On the other hand the true champion athletes are focused on the long-term from the very beginning and they never take shortcuts. They do the work in the off-season and over the course of years develop outstanding conditioning, strength, and stay injury free. They also are the ones who may have missed out on winning the championship in 7th grade but eventually end up with scholarship offers and notable accomplishments when it counts.

To conclude, I hope this article sheds some light on just how important off-season training really is to in-season performance. If you pay the price of time and sweat during the off-season you certainly will reap the benefits during the heat of the battle in-season.


Developing Weapons on the Tennis Court

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As my good friend and mentor Coach Chuck Kriese says tennis is a “High Beta Sport.”  I have blogged before that tennis is really an eye-hand combative sport.  It is like two gladiators walking into the arena and only one gets to leave victorious.  Tennis is a civilized form of eye-hand combat and there is no time clock, which means you must finish your opponent off.  We really are asking our players to be sophisticated gladiators or polite boxers.  It is not often people think of tennis this way but it is exactly what happens out there when two players take the court for a match.

Kitchen KnivesLet me provide an analogy for you.  Going into the gladiator arena would you rather have two 3-foot swords or one 5-foot sword and one 1-foot sword?  Even though both total up to 6 feet I know I would much rather have the 5-foot sword combination. Think of all the advantages and how much easier it would be to hurt your opponent with the longer sword.

Here is how the analogy relates to tennis players.  If your forehand and backhand are equally good that is wonderful.  However, imagine if your forehand or your serve are significantly better than all your other strokes.  In that case you have a big weapon that can be used to hurt your opponent with often.

I am not saying you should neglect developing the weaker parts of your game, because if your backhand is weak you need to make it stronger.  What I am saying is that if you have developed a weapon like a big serve or forehand use it and develop your game plan around using it often.  Many times players focus all their efforts on improving their weaknesses but never continuing to improve upon their strengths and that is a mistake.

And if you happen to come up against an opponent with a big weapon you had better make sure you do everything you can to avoiding getting hurt by it.


New Balance High School Tennis Championships

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There is a groundbreaking annual tournament that will be launching this summer!  I say it is groundbreaking because it finally puts High School Tennis at the forefront of the Junior Tennis World…

New Balance is sponsoring the first annual National High School Tennis Championships.  It is going to be a top-notch singles event and anyone is eligible to enter as long as they competed on their school’s varsity tennis team.

The tournament will be held in Boston, MA July 21-25 at Harvard University.  During that week 64 Boys & 64 Girls will compete in a compass draw to determine the best High School Tennis Player in the country.  The winners will be receiving a wild card into the ITF International Hard Court Tennis Championships at the JTCC in College Park, MD.  New Balance is subsidizing the costs and providing some pretty amazing amenities to the player selected to play.  You can enter online at TennisLink and the tournament ID# is 450042714.

Players will be selected based on their Universal Tennis Ranking (UTR).  If you have no idea what UTR is I suggested reading a post I wrote some time ago about the difference between Rating vs. Rankings.  And because they are using UTR as the means of selection it will have no impact on player eligibility in Pennsylvania High School Tennis, I know because I am on the committee and asked…

Finally, take an hour out of your day and listen to my friend Lisa Stone interview Bruce Shilling from New Balance and Bill Mountford from USTA who are spearheading the ground breaking High School Tennis Championship.

Current Sports Podcasts at Blog Talk Radio with UR10s on BlogTalkRadio with UR10s Radio on BlogTalkRadio

The Power of Consistency

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I have been writing posts with valuable information about how to develop tennis players this week.  I want to round it out by talking about the power of consistency.

The first thing that comes to most people’s mind when I say consistency is keeping the ball in play.  Be clear that is not what I am talking about here.  What I mean by “consistency” is the consistency in coaching and the messages the player is receiving over a long period of time.

Algebra 101Imagine yourself in a high school algebra class.  On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday you have Mr. Smith as your teacher and on Tuesdays and Thursdays you have Mrs. Jones.  Mr. Smith and Mrs. Jones are both award winning teachers but they never talk to one another, never plan anything together, and have different proven methods and progressions for teaching algebra.  As a student you get confused very quickly because there is no consistency from day to day.  In fact, you never end up learning algebra from either one of the world-class teachers because you never get to practice the same concepts consistently over the course of time.

All too often the same exact thing happens in the world of developing tennis players.  There are many great and proven coaches.  All good coaches have, over time, developed their own teaching methods and progressions.  I personally do not agree with many things other coaches do and I am sure many do not agree with me either.  The truth is neither is probably right or wrong.  The only time it becomes wrong is when a player is trying to learn from both coaches at the same time.  The messages are not consistent and it is a disaster and real shame for the player’s development.

This inconsistency often happens within junior tennis programs as well.  If all of the coaches are not on the same page with what they are teaching, the methods, progression, and terminology it is inconsistent and works against maximizing player development.  Even though everything is housed in one location the message is still inconsistent.  This is exactly why schools have curriculums and invest heavily in educating their staff.  The secret is not one magic curriculum or algebra teacher.  Instead, the secret is consistency and progression in the messages being sent over the course of weeks, months, and years.

I have been to visit some of the greatest tennis programs in the country, such as the Junior Tennis Champions Center (JTCC).  In my time spent there the thing that sets JTCC apart from so many other programs is consistency.  All of the coaches are on the same page and are working towards the same goal.  Much like a school, the JTCC heavily invests in educating their own coaches.  The messages the players receive on a daily basis are consistent and that is the real secret to the work they do.

JTCC's Outdoor Courts

JTCC’s Outdoor Courts

To prove my point about how important consistency is look at some of the best tennis players in the world.  Think about players like Andre Agassi, Martina Hingis, Serena Williams.  They were all coached by their parents for most of their lives.  Their parents were not world-class tennis coaches or players but their parents were consistent.  Some of them consistently crazy but none the less consistent.  Even Rafael Nadal was coached and still is consistently by his Uncle Tony who taught him to use his left hand, even though he was right handed!

So please if you are reading this blog post understand the importance of consistency in working with a coach.  Not everything will always go smoothly when developing a tennis player.  There will be times of struggle and there will also be triumph.  The good and bad times are what make a relationship strong.  Even though at times finding a new coach when things are hard may seem like the right thing to do be wise in sticking with a coach consistently.

The power of consistency is invaluable over the long-term climb up the mountain of player development.


The Secret 80% of People Do Not Know

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I am going to let you in on a little secret.  It may be the most actionable piece of information you ever hear for developing a champion athlete.  And if you really use the secret you’ll be doing things different than 80% of the people in youth sports.

The secret is to think in terms of Long-Term Development.  You see I would venture to say that 80% of people think about things in the short-term.  They think about doing well in the tournament next week or cramming in lessons and training right before the varsity tennis season starts.  They want results “right now” and are constantly looking for the short-term fix.  This is the reason you see junior players bounce from program to program and pro to pro.  When something is not working “right now” they think the answer is to make a short-term change.  This is the mentality of about 80% of people out there.

Long-Term Development

Now contrast that with a mindset of Long-Term Development.  This mindset is nothing more than planning from the very beginning for the long haul and mindfully aligning everything in an effort to reach that goal far off on the horizon.  It is characterized by a growth mindset, slow and steady progress, making little improvements each day, and not getting caught up in short-term successes and setbacks.

Planning for the long-term is not easy because it takes a great deal of wisdom and foresight.  In the world of tennis this would be taking a 7-year-old and developing him or her to become the best they can be at 20+ years of age.  Along the way taking no shortcuts and committing to believe and trust in the plan.  In my experiences those who have had the most success were also those who committed to the idea of long-term development from the very beginning.

If you think about it, regardless of the sport, you are really only competing against 20% of everyone involved.  Right off the bat, about 80% of the people are only focused on the short-term and that means in the long-term they really have no chance to do something special.  If you have the mindset of long-term development, you are only competing against the other 20% of people who are thinking the same way as you.

Having the mindset of long-term development will give you the edge when it matters most in an athletes career.


Mountain of Player Development

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I just recently sat down with two parents and a young man to discuss moving into the world of tournament tennis.  In that conversation I compared climbing a mountain to developing a tennis player and I am going to share the same analogy with you.

Player Development Mountain

At first climbing a mountain is easy,  the slope is not very great and you can cover a lot of ground quickly.  The same is true in tennis,  when you first begin your journey the concept is simple, play a lot of tennis.  The more balls you hit, lesson you take, clinics do, and matches you play the better you become.  There is a direct relationship between the time invested and rate improvement.  Tennis is a repetition sport and you cannot skip past putting in the time no matter how good the instruction.  Quantity is important but I should make a point to say in moderation.  If a 7-year-old is playing 80 hours of tennis a week that is not good for their long-term development.

As a climber makes his way further up the mountain it becomes more and more difficult to make progress.  The same is true for tennis players.  Eventually there comes a point where hitting more and more tennis balls has a rate of diminishing returns.  This is a big sticking point in a player’s development.  At this point in time the level of instruction a player is getting is of paramount importance.  In order to continue to climb and improve mental and emotional skills must be developed.

Mental skills are concepts like shot-selection, routines between points, and momentum management.  Emotional skills revolve around understanding match-ups, balancing respect for an opponent, and overcoming the pecking order.  Players at this level must work both incredibly hard and smart.  Working hard alone is not enough to continue climbing the mountain of improvement.  At this stage progress is slow and as Coach Chuck Kriese says,  “The work a player does here pays off 6 months or a year from now.”

If a player makes it this far up the mountain they are better than 80% of the people in the world who play tennis and continued improvement is just as difficult as getting past an overhanging ledge right before you reach the summit of the mountain.

When someone climbs Mt.Everest they hire a guide because the guide has been to the summit and know the best path to get there.  The same is true for a tennis player in the last leg of his or her development, they need a guide.  Getting past that overhang is incredibly difficult and it takes good coaching, mentoring, and role-models who know the way.  Certainly a player could go out and make it on their own with no guidance just as someone could summit Everest without a guide.  However, having a knowledgeable mentor at this difficult to navigate pass saves a tremendous amount of time and costly mistakes.

Let me know what you think about this analogy in the comments below and if you are looking for a place to get in the repetitions early in your journey or develop mental and emotional skills to continue your progress consider my Summer Tennis Camp.  If you are at the overhang send me an email and I’ll put you in touch with a world-class mentor.


The Strength Deficit as it Relates to Tennis

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WeddingMy wife and I workout together in our cozy little home basement gym.  She has been crushing it for some time now and getting strong!  She normally doesn’t ask too many questions and just does what I program for her.  And I do have a method for programming workouts that involves what I am about to tell you about.

However, the other day she decided to do one of those follow-along video workouts. There was a lot of plyometric jumps involved which sparked some conversation over dinner about a little known concept called the Strength Deficit.  I am going to simplify the concept for you and if you are a tennis player it is absolutely critical to maximizing performance through off court training.

There are two kinds of strength you need to understand before we can move on to defining the strength deficit.

The first type is Absolute Strength.  This kind of strength is the absolute maximum amount of contractile force a muscle is capable of producing involuntarily.  In a laboratory setting we could stimulate your nerves with an electrical impulse causing the muscle fibers to contract.  In doing this experiment one could theoretically measure the absolute maximum contractile force your muscles are capable of producing.  Absolute strength is closely related to the size of the muscle fibers.  In other words, the larger the muscle is the greater the absolute strength potential.

The second type of strength is the Competitive Maximum.  This is the maximum amount of contractile force a muscle can produce voluntarily.  In other words this is the force you are capable of creating under your own control.  The competitive maximum is related directly to your central nervous system (CNS).  The stronger the impulse your can send through your nerves to the muscle fibers the more forcefully you can get them to contract.

So now that you understand that the absolute maximum is involuntary and the competitive maximum is voluntary we can get to the Strength Deficit.  The strength deficit is simply the difference between the two.  It should be noted that the absolute strength will always be higher than the competitive maximum because you will always be able to involuntarily contract muscle fibers to produce more strength compared to what you can do voluntarily.

Strength Deficit

What the strength deficit tells an athlete about their current state is amazingly insightful.  And if you know how to interpret the information it gives you a roadmap for how to continue making strength gains.

Here is how to interpret the strength deficit…

If the competitive maximum is close to the absolute strength you have a small strength deficit. A small deficit means that an athlete is able to send strong messages to the muscles and stimulate a strong contraction.  This is a very good sign because it means they are capable of utilizing most of their capacity for strength.  If an athlete with a small strength deficit wants to improve they need to focus their efforts on muscle hypertrophy or growth in order to raise the level of absolute strength.

If the competitive maximum is further from absolute strength you have a large strength deficit.  This means the potential for strength is there but the CNS is not capable of creating a strong enough signal to excite the muscle fibers to utilize it.  This tells an athlete they have room for strength gains without putting on more muscle.  Gains can be made by specifically designing explosive training sessions to stimulate CNS development.  Focusing on gaining more muscle mass will only increase absolute strength and the strength deficit further.

Now before I go any further the strength deficit is a fairly advanced concept and I do not want you running out and applying this to kids or beginners.  You really need to know what you are doing and this is just a overly simple blog post explaining the bigger concept.  If you want more information I recommend reading a highly complex book translated from the work of Russian Sport Scientist Yuri Verkhoshansky, Super Training.  With that being said if you are just getting started lifting weights you will see improvements in both absolute strength and competitive maximums quickly.  Beginners just have more room to make adaptations and improve.  However, if you are hitting plateaus, it is a good idea to look at your strength deficit and see if you should focus your efforts on gaining more muscle size and absolute strength potential or finding ways to stimulate the CNS and its ability to maximize muscle fiber contractibility.

Now think about a competitive tennis player’s needs…

First, tennis players need explosive and powerful muscle contractions.  They need to swing the racket with amazing accelerations and speed.  Players need to be able to sprint, change directions, and reaccelerate again.  These skills require a great deal of power without having an enormous body building style muscular frame that can slow an athlete down.  By now you should be able to guess that tennis players should have a small strength deficit.  Tennis players want to be able to maximally contract the muscle fibers they have.  That is not to say that there is never a time to build bulk and absolute strength because there is.  However, once muscle hypertrophy or mass is gained it should be followed up with a block of training to stimulate the CNS to utilize that new found strength potential fully.  Players like Djokovic, Nadal, and Federer are incredibly strong and I would bet they also have a small strength deficit.

Questions or comments leave them below and I will be happy to answer them.


720 Degree Coaching – Radio Interview

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I was the featured guest on Bill Patton’s 720 Degree Internet Tennis Radio Show.  Bill Patton is a coaching friend from the West Coast and it was an honor to talk about how I got involved with the game, coaching philosophies, and share information about my tennis training camps.

Popular Goals Internet Radio with 720 Degree Coaching on BlogTalkRadio

Tennis is Real-Life Flappy Birds

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Tennis is arguably the most difficult sport of all to become very good at.  At the higher levels of the game it takes tremendous athleticism, technical proficiency, mental capacity, and emotional toughness.  Who in the world would want to pursue something that is so difficult?

I was recently talking with a kid about this iPhone game called Flappy Birds.  It is notorious for being extremely difficult.  It also is known for being one of the most downloaded apps ever and one of the most addictive.

Flappy Birds Screen Shot

After I played the game I found myself very intrigued and deep in thought.  You see this game is different than most because it is so difficult.  Kids will give up or get bored in 15 minutes or less with easier games but not Flappy Birds.  It is the level of difficulty that makes it fun.

You see the real fun is not being successful.  Things that are easy to achieve success with get boring quickly.  The real fun is in pursuit of achieving success with something that is difficult.  I know in my life the things that have been the most fun and fulfilling have been the things that have been the most difficult.

Tennis is the real-life version of Flappy Birds.  It is the pursuit of excellence on the tennis court that makes it so much fun.  In the process it also teaches tremendously valuable life-long lessons.

Think about registering your child for Summer Tennis Camp and I think you will find that once they pick up a racket it will be hard for them to put it down.


Why is Movement Paramount in Tennis?

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Movement on the tennis court might be the most important aspect of the modern game.  That is a bold statement considering the overwhelming majority of players spend most of their practice time focusing exclusively on technique.

Consider these figures…

Singles Court Dimensions78′ by 27′ are the dimensions of the singles court.

A ball that is traveling at 60 miles per hour is moving at a rate of 88 feet per second.  That means if you hit the ball down the line at 60 mph it gets there in less than a second, assuming it has enough topspin to keep it inside the lines.

Since the NFL started implementing electric timing of the 40-yard dash the record holder is Chris Johnson.  He ran the 40-yard dash in 4.24 seconds, which equates to moving at a rate of 28.3 feet per second.

If we put Chris Johnson, who owns the fastest 40-yard dash, on the singles sideline and hit the ball down the line at 60 mph he would make it just before the ball got there!

Think about the implications of all these numbers.  Johnson obviously possesses world-class speed and he is just barely making it there in time.  What about younger athletes who are not at the world-class level of speed?  Also consider that 60 mph ball down the line is not even that fast considering there are professionals striking the ball well in excess of 100 mph.  Andy Murray hit a blistering forehand at 124mph in Cincinnati last summer!

Naturally as players improve the speed at which they rally from the ground increases.  The technology of rackets and strings also continue to enhance the speed at which players can hit the ball.  This is all wonderful until the rally tempo becomes so fast the athlete can no longer get to balls.  It is absolutely critical for developing players to improve both their movement and ball striking skills in unison.  Tremendous ball striking skills are great if you can literally hit so fast that you can blow an opponent off the court.  When an opponent has fairly equal ball striking ability the difference is movement.  The player who moves better is the one who will perform better.

This ball striking and movement conundrum is often very apparent in the younger age divisions of junior tournament play.  In the younger age groups typically the players who are the best ball strikers tend to win the most.  However, as age progresses, other players “catch up” and ball striking skills tend to level out.  This is the point where the players who move well now have the advantage.  Many times the players who were successful in the younger age categories try to compensate in the older groups by attempting to hit the ball harder.  The problem is you can only hit the ball so hard and it is a scenario of diminishing returns.  Their time would be better spent improving movement around the court.

I tell players they are in a race with the ball.  If a player beats the ball there, then they have the opportunity to return a high quality shot.  If a player gets there at the same time as the ball, they will not be able to setup and end up hitting a weak reply.  Finally, if the ball beats them there then obviously they lost the point.

You cannot defy the laws of physics and the math above proves it.  So what are the keys to moving well on the court?  Have an explosive first step, proper recovery positioning, good anticipatory skills, be able to hit open-stance on both sides, and have efficient footwork patterns that facilitate both quickness and maximize ball striking.