Volleyball Toolbox

Volleyball Agility Drills

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Agility is important in every sport and volleyball is not any different. The ability of your players to quickly change directions while maintaining their balance will allow them to be more effective on the court. Here are 10 Volleyball Agility Drills that you can incorporate into your daily practices and/or your offseason training program.

In th clip below Keyatta May, head coach at Coppin State, shares 1o different volleyball agility drills that she uses with her teams. Each drill has multiple variations that require the athlete to execute a wide variety of movement patterns. All of the volleyball agility drills can be executed with very simple equipment like cones, mini-hurdles and poly spots making them easy to set up and take down.

These are simple yet effective drills that could easily be incorporated into the first 10-15 minutes of a practice session. They could  simply become part of your daily pre-practice warm-up routine. While you certainly would not want to do all of the exercises and their varitations each practice,  you could simply pick a 2-3 different drills  to do each day.  Taking 10-15 minutes each day to do agility work will pay big dividends. Despite spending just a few minutes each day you will see improvement in the movement of your athletes. The better they move, the better they will be at executing their volleyball skills.

The clip is just a small portion of Coach May’s presentation on Volleyball Specific Agility Drills at a recent Glazier Volleyball Clinic. For information about how to gain access to her entire presentations, as well as hundreds of other great clinic presentations, just click the link Glazier Volleyball Clinics. 

The YouTube video below has audio, so please make sure that your volume is turned up and that you have access to the site. Note that some schools block access to Youtube. If you are having trouble viewing at school, please contact your network administrator.


Core Strength

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This article was provided by Coaches Network

Core strength and stability are important for athletes in every sport. Not only does having a solid core maximize power in sport specific movements, it also helps reduce the risk of injury. However, your athletes will probably get bored if they are doing the same crunches, sit ups, and planks over and over. Instead, try adding the stir the pot exercise to your program.

In a blog for Girls Gone Strong, Molly Galbraith, CSCS, explains that the stir the pot increases the strength of the anterior core, while also serving as an anti-extension exercise. It can also be used for many purposes, including as a warm up or even for conditioning. And all it requires is a stability ball. Here are the steps to carrying out the stir the pot, laid out by Galbraith:

  1. Place your forearms on a Swiss ball and your toes on the ground in plank position (or your knees if this is too hard).
  2. Position your elbows slightly ahead of your shoulders.
  3. Keep your body in a straight line and your spine in neutral alignment.
  4. Take a deep breath through your nice, tuck in your rib cage towards your hips, contract the muscles around your trunk and glutes and perform your chosen movement.

“With the movements, you have different options: You can move your arms in one direction, move them in the other direction, or one really popular idea is to actually go through the alphabet, so think A,B,C,D,” writes Galbraith. “You can also do figure eights.”

According to a blog by Fitness Coach Sean Nalewanyj, some athletes may need to build their strength in order to hold the correct posture throughout the movement. You can help with this by having them engage in a stationary plank on the floor with elbows bent at 90 degrees. Once they can hold this for 60 seconds, Nalewanyj suggests moving them to a stationary plank with arms on the Swiss ball. When they can hold this position for 60 seconds, they are ready to move on to the stir the pot.

If your athlete finds the exercise too easy, Galbraith suggests adding some resistance. This could mean placing a weight plate on the lower back or elevating their feet on a bench. No matter how you decide to implement the exercise, it is important that your athletes utilize the correct technique at all times.

To help with this, Galbraith offers a few coaching tips. One is to always keep the body straight. The athlete’s head should not drop and the hips should not sag. Galbraith also recommends keeping the chin tucked and breathing in through the nose and out through the mouth during the entire exercise.

While there are many options for type of movement, Nalewanyj recommends doing circular motions of 8-15 repetitions per set, and reversing the direction of the circle every 2-4 rotations. Once your athlete can do this without issue, you can also increase difficulty by having them move their arms in larger circles.


Exercises to Produce Power

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Every coach would like their hitter to hit harder. Here are two volleyball specific exercises designed to help your hitters hit harder and reduce injuries.

In the two clips below Reid Hall, a volleyball specific strength and conditioning coach, demonstrates to simple effective exercises that you can easily incorporate into your off season program or as part of your in season practices.

The first exercise is a thoracic mobility exercise. This exercise will help with thoracic rotation and creates stretch in the chest and shoulders. The end result will be greater rotation of the torso and thus greater power when hitting.

To begin the player should lay on their side with their hips forming a vertical line towards the ceiling.The top leg should be bent to 90 degrees and the side of the knee placed on a foam roller (optional). The athlete will push down on the foam roller and maintain that pressure throughout the exercise.

Next the athlete will take their top hand and reach forward and turn their thumb towards the ground. With the thumb touching the ground, the athlete  move their arm in a semi-circle reaching as far behind themselves as possible. When they have rotated and reached as far as possible behind themselves, they will return the arm to the starting position.

The second exercise is called external rotation from the frontal plane. This is an exercise designed to work the group of  muscles that make up the rotator cuff.  This exercise can be done using a cable machine or a band.

The athlete begins by standing with the cable machine (or band attachment) to their side. Then with the outside arm (the one furthest from the machine) grab the cable. The arm should held in front and bent at 90 degrees. The forearm should be parallel to the ground. The athlete will slowly rotate their arm up, pulling on the cable until their forearm is perpendicular to the ground.

These are just two exercises that Coach Hall utilizes when training his volleyball athletes. He has many great ideas for training volleyball players. You can check him out at Reids-Workouts

The YouTube videos below has audio, so please make sure that your sound is turned up


Core Exercises for Volleyball

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Core strength is essential for volleyball players. Here are three safe core exercises that will make your players more powerful and help prevent injuries.

In the clip below Reid Hall, a volleyball specific strength and conditioning coach, demonstrates three variation of the pallof press. These are very safe yet extremely effective exercises for strengthening the core as they work all muscles of the core.

To do a level 1 pallof press wrap a band around a pole. Holding the band with two hands and step out far enough to feel some tension. Standing with the pole to your side, squeeze your glutes and abs. With the band in your hand, pres forward from chest height. Do 12-15 slow repetitions and then repeat facing the other direction. This core exercise can be made more difficult by simply stepping further from the pole.

A level 2 pallof press would be executed in the same fashion, with one exception. In this variation, your athletes will step away from the pole and then sink into a squat position before pressing their arms forward. Again do 12-15 slow reps facing each direction.

A level 3 pallof press requires the athlete to begin in a lunge position(split stance). Holding the band in both hands and with the outside leg forward, the athlete will press forward slowly for 12-15 reps. the drill should be repeated facing the other direction. When doing this variation the athlete should be careful not to let the knee of the front foot move too far forward ( not past the toes).

These are three core exercises that work all muscles of the core and work to improve the athlete’s ability to stabilize. They are effective and do not put stress on the lower back/ spine like more traditional core exercises like sit-ups and crunches.

For more volleyball conditioning ideas check out Reids-workouts.

The YouTube video below has audio, so please make sure that your sound is turned up and that you have access to the site. Note that some schools block access to YouTube


Resistance Band Exercises for Volleyball

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Resistance band exercises are great exercises for volleyball players. They are safe and very easy to incorporate into your training program.  No weight room required

In the video clips below Reid Hall, volleyball specific strength and conditioning coach, demonstrates three simple, effective and safe resistance band exercises that will improve the performance of volleyball players. These exercises can easily be incorporated into your daily practices and/or your off season training program.

The first resistance band exercise is called the Banded Face Pull. This exercise focuses on the building strength in the upper back and the back of the shoulder. The Banded Face Pull is also great for improving the mobility of the shoulder blade.

The exercise can be easily adapted to different athletes and strength levels. For less resistance move closer to the point of attachment. For more resistance simply move further away. You can also change bands as different color bands represent varying degrees of resistance.

When performing the pull, the athlete should have their palms facing the ground. The band should be pulled towards the eyes. The shoulder blades should be pulled down and towards each other. Pause for one second with the shoulder blades pulled together. The elbows should finish slightly higher than the shoulders when pulling the band back. The athlete should concentrate on keeping their abs  and glutes contracted while they are pulling the band back.

The next two exercises are designed to help volleyball players effectively cover a large amount of the court by helping them maintain a good defensive posture and developing a strong first step. Both exercises utilize two green (high resistance) bands interlocked and attached to a pole.

Resistance band exercise number two is the Banded Turn and Sprint. The athlete will wrap the band around  their waist and forward with the pole (point if attachment of the resistance band to their side).  The athlete will start in volleyball posture.  With their knees bent, hands in front of the body and shoulders in front of the knees, the athlete will drive off the leg closest to the pole and accelerate forward.

The third resistance band exercise is the  Banded Lateral Drive Step. The set up is the same as the previous exercise. The athlete will drive off the leg that is closes to the pole and shuffle to the side while maintaining a good volleyball posture.

Learn more about how Coach Hall can help you train you players at Reids-Workouts

The YouTube videos below have audio, so please make sure that your volume is turned up and that you have access to the site. Note some schools block access to YouTube.