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7 Essential Warm Up Drills for Pickleball

The Art of Pickleball trainer Brittany McNevin

Brittany McNevin

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This video looks at warm up exercises you can do before playing pickleball.

A great exercise to start with are high kick toe touches. You can do these across the court, keeping your core tight.  

Then you’re going to do walking lunges. You want to make sure your knee doesn’t go past your toe and then you can step into it.  

Next, you’re going to wrap up our hamstrings with hamstring sweeps. You’re going to straighten your leg, sit back on to your butt, and you’re going to sweep. And then you’re going to take a step. Sweep, sweep, keep your core tight, your back flat. You don’t have to go fast and just do it all the way across the court and back.  

Then you’re going to warm up your hips with an exercise called open the gate, close the gate. We’re going to open it on the way there. We’re going to close it on the way back. You’re going to bring your leg up, half circle, bring it back in, half circle.  

Now you’re going to do some back kicks. If you have bad knees, you can just do a quad stretch across the court. And if not, you’re going to kick your butt. Keep your short, quick movement just to warm up your muscles. Make sure your heels touch your glutes. You’re not in a race.  

Next, you’re going to do sumo squats. So you want to squat, sit back into your heels like you’re sitting in a chair, and then you’re going to turn across the court, making sure your knees don’t go above your toes or before your toes.  

The last one you’re going to do is high knees. You want to put your hands in front of you then try and get the tops of your knees to touch the bottom of your hands.

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