Pickleball is an easy game to learn, an incredibly fun and challenging game to play and a difficult game to truly master. When first starting out, trying to remember all the advice and best practices can get overwhelming and may lead to overthinking in the middle of a game which leads to missed shots.
We’ve put together 15 tips “core” strategies – you must master to increase your skill level. Drilling and purposefully practicing shots and game situations that you find challenging can really accelerate your learning curve.
The final tip, even the Pros agree is the most necessary skill to master!
1. Develop a Strategic Serve:
Your serve sets the tone for the point. Experiment with varying the depth and pace of your serves to keep your opponents guessing and off balance. A mix of deep serves and shorter, angled serves can complicate their return strategy. When just starting out, work on one until you become nearly automatic in your consistency, then move on to the next.
2. Practice Shot Placement Under Pressure:
A lot of us take the time to drill with friends to try to gain mastery of a certain shot. However, just because you are able to consistently employ that shot in drills does not mean that practice is over. Work on placing those shots while under pressure. Work with a better player and have them force you to face harder hits and more wicked spins to force you to adjust your grip and force used while still focusing on your shot placements.
3. Enhance your Footwork:
Good footwork is the foundation of a strong pickleball game. Focus on drills that improve your lateral movement, quick steps, and transitions between forward and backward movements. Efficient footwork allows you to position yourself optimally for shots and enhances your defensive and offensive game.
4. The Split Step:
The first key to great footwork is the split step. You need to activate your body’s movement early, by getting in ready stance right after your shot, rising to the balls of your feet as soon as your opponent makes their move, leveraging the principle that a moving object tends to continue moving, enhancing your reaction time.
5. Communication:
In doubles play, effective communication is key. Develop a system of verbal and non-verbal cues with your partner to indicate shot intentions, who will take the ball, and when to switch positions. Clear communication can prevent overlaps and missed opportunities.
6. The Mental Game:
Pickleball isn’t just a physical game; it’s also mental. Cultivate patience, focus, and the ability to stay calm under pressure. Techniques such as visualization, deep breathing, and setting small, achievable goals can help maintain a positive mindset and improve performance.
7. Consistency:
While cross-court shots can be effective, they come with a high risk of errors. Consider directing more shots down the middle to reduce mistakes and potentially confuse your opponents. When first starting out, remember when you keep the ball in play, you give your opponent one more opportunity to make a mistake. Once you are consistency able to return shots to the middle, work on these cross-court shots.
8. Anticipate Your Opponent’s Shot:
Pay attention to the speed and angle of your opponent’s paddle and the positioning of their feet to anticipate the ball’s direction. When first starting out, your one and only goal is to keep your eye on the ball, but as you improve, you can learn to follow the path of the ball by noticing the physical cues of your opponent. This will allow you to get into position to return the shot more quickly.
9. Get Out of Your Comfort Zone:
All of us have shots that we find truly challenging. Unfortunately, many players seek to avoid those shots any way they can during games. One example of this is a player who struggles with their backhand, so she runs around the shot to hit with her forehand. Yes, you want to keep the ball in play, but you must practice these difficult shots during games, at least a certain percentage of the time in order to improve, even if you lose a few points.
Find someone who has mastered this shot and ask them to break down the mechanics with you. Have them hit the shot while you watch them from all angles so you can see the stroke, the footwork, and the grip they employ. (Hint: new players should seek out current or former tennis players. They are great resources for these basic shots that seem to allude players with no prior racket sports’ experience.)
10. Adjust to Left Handed Opponents:
In doubles play against a team with one lefty, unless your opponents are “stacking,” they will both have their backhands to the middle of the court at various points in the game. Target the center of the court during these times.
11. Volley Poorly Hit Dinks When Appropriate:
If you have the opportunity to hit a dinked ball out of the air, do it! Don’t back up and allow it to bounce. But do not lean so far forward that you are off balance. Bend your knees and engage the ball in the air.
12. 70% Goal:
Focus on executing shots with a success rate of over 70% during games and concentrate on honing the ones you’re less confident with during practice. This allows for longer rallies and better competition for the majority of the game and also time to work on the shots you dread a couple times per game.
13. Slow Opponent’s Advance to the Net:
Prevent your opponents from advancing to the net by delivering deep, powerful shots to keep them in the defensive position.
14. Intense Focus For Fast Serves:
When you are facing a server who serves like a bullet out of a gun, hyper-focus on the ball from the very start of their serve. Frequently, especially for new players, we watch their whole body in amazement to try to learn how they achieve such velocity, by the time your register that information, it’s too late! See the ball and only the ball. Unless these players are very advanced, one thing newer fast servers tend to do is to target the same location with their serve, because they are so focused on speed and not placement. Note where there serves tend to go and cheat to that spot once they have committed. If they are advanced players and fast servers, this cheat is likely to backfire, beware.
15. PATIENCE IS A VIRTUE:
If you have watched advanced players in person at your park, or on television or YouTube you will feel at first like they play so fast! But pay close attention, these players might be moving quickly and hitting the ball hard, but they are exercising patience on every single shot. This is one of the most crucial skills to learn and it seems so counterintuitive but even the Pros will tell you it is the most important aspect of the game.
Patience during a rally: Wait for a high percentage winner, rather than forcing a shot and creating an unforced error.
Patience during a return: Have your paddle ready, your grip right, be on the balls of your feet and focus on ball placement.
Patience during a game: Don’t get overwhelmed after a bad shot or when you find your team down after a great run by your opponents. Take a breath, one shot at a time. Pickleball is a game of streaks and keeping your head in the game is the best way to make an epic comeback.
