Planets have a tangent velocity, and the sun's gravitational pull pulls Earth towards it. This provides balance, that keeps Earth moving around the sun. When this is clear to you, you will understand why orbits become elliptical.
An Animation from Wikipedia shows how planets
move away in elliptical orbits
For an Example, imagine a pole fixed to a position, with a rope tied to it. A man starts to hold the rope, and start to move around the pole. When his speed increases, he will not be able to hold the rope tightly, and will fall after a period of time. The same is with planets. When they are close, that means that it is holding to the rope from the sun. When it is moving away, it's grip gets loose, and moves away from the Sun. But when it comes back again to its mean position, it is able to hold on to the rope and therefore, close to the sun. If its speed increases, it will loose the grip of the rope, and escape the orbit. When its speed is little less than the speed to escape the orbit, it moves a little bit away from the sun. Its speed is greatest when near the sun and slow, when away from the sun.
Sometimes, there may be very tiny irregularities of the path of orbit, due to the gravity of other planets like Mars and Jupiter.
Answer by - M. Santosh
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