The word tennis tends to summon a specific image: two players, a net, long silent stretches between points. Cardio Tennis was designed to break that image apart. It is a group fitness class built on tennis drills, games, and constant movement, and it has grown into one of the fastest-developing participation programs in the sport — including here on the Gulf Coast, where tennis pros at clubs like the Lakewood Club in Point Clear run regular sessions.
A fitness product, disguised as tennis
Cardio Tennis was created in 2005 as a joint effort between the United States Tennis Association and the Tennis Industry Association. The reasoning was simple: fitness classes were drawing crowds that traditional tennis programming was not, so the industry built a class that borrowed tennis skills but felt like an aerobics workout. It caught on. The program now counts millions of participants in the United States and is offered in more than thirty countries, with the USTA describing it as an engaging group fitness class featuring the heart-pumping effects of tennis drills, games, and activities for all ages and abilities.
The secret weapon is the ball. Cardio Tennis uses low-compression “Cardio Balls” that move slower and bounce lower than standard tennis balls, which levels the playing field between a lifelong player and someone who has never held a racket. Nobody has to rally like a pro to keep a rally alive, so nobody stops moving.
What a class actually looks like
A typical session runs like a well-designed group exercise class with courts instead of a studio. It opens with a dynamic warm-up — movement drills, catching and throwing, light hitting — that doubles as an icebreaker among players who often arrived as strangers. From there, groups rotate between courts, cycling through cardio drills, skill work, and short games before a cool-down closes things out.
At the Lakewood Club in Point Clear, tennis professional Matt McKelvain describes classes set to upbeat music, with three footwork patterns doing much of the conditioning work: the sidestep, the karaoke crossover, and the back step. The result is a genuinely rigorous workout rather than a leisurely knockabout. The calorie estimates attached to the program are substantial — the USTA’s guidance suggests men can burn between 500 and 1,000 calories in a single class, with women burning between 300 and 500, depending on intensity.
Why players keep coming back
The program’s pitch to lapsed players is a familiar one on the Gulf Coast: it is a way back into tennis that does not require finding a regular doubles partner or committing to a league. Members who take the Point Clear classes describe the same three motives — getting back into tennis, getting exercise, and having fun — usually in that order after the first session.
Because the drills are social and fast-moving, the class also works for players who never left the game. Rotating partners and courts means a stronger player gets a workout rather than a mismatch, and a beginner gets repetition without pressure. The music and the group format do the rest.
Finding a class on the Gulf Coast
Cardio Tennis programming typically ramps up in the fall, when temperatures across coastal Alabama and northwest Florida finally make sustained outdoor exercise reasonable. Club tennis centers throughout the area — from Point Clear to Mobile and across Baldwin County — run sessions for members and, in many cases, for non-members who want to try the format.
Anyone curious can check with a local tennis professional or search the USTA’s Cardio Tennis listings for nearby programs. Athletic shoes, a water bottle, and a tolerance for being slightly out of breath are the only real prerequisites. The sport supplies the rest — including, for many first-timers, the surprising discovery that an hour of tennis drills can feel closer to a spin class than a country club morning.