Long-time readers know a few things about me:
1. I’m a little wacky.
2. I’ve loved New Balance since they were a client of mine a few years ago. I think it’s a truly amazing company with amazing products and amazing people. (I got to tour their factory and totally geeked out.)
3. I loved tennis far before I loved running or any other fitness activity.
Also, I LOVE causing rackets. Er, racquets?
So off to the Vanderbilt Tennis Club I went yesterday morning with my coworkers.
Dual identities.
First of all, the Vanderbilt Tennis Club is kind of confusing to get to. It’s above Grand Central and the elevators are weird, and yeah.
I remember when I worked with NB a few years ago and the tennis line was launched, and it was a big deal.
HELLO AND WELCOME TO MY NATURAL HABITAT. Seriously, before I knew what meditation was, when I wanted to calm down, I’d close my eyes and just imagine hitting the ball back and forth, back and forth in a long, slow rally with a friend. Is that weird? Probably.
In the summers in high school, I’d play all day, everyday, and I loved it. Indoors, outdoors, you just couldn’t get me off the court. It’s kind of a pain to play in NYC, so I rarely do, but every time I play, I want to play more and more. I have a standing bet with my COO to beat him in tennis (and the 800m), so I better get practicing.
So much of my misspent youth was spent convening around a basket of yellow balls, piling balls on my racquet or filling up a hopper.
But I digress. Yesterday, they took us through a number of drills, and I felt like I was 14 again.
I knew nothing technical about tennis shoes when I last played seriously, and I don’t play seriously enough to know much now, but we were given the 996s to try out. They felt lightweight, and it was easy to move laterally in them. I made the mistake of grabbing a pair of old white sneaks that WEREN’T tennis sneaks a few weeks ago, and yeah, no. I don’t know how I didn’t twist an ankle.
It’s like they knew. I can never have enough tennis whites, Jordan is mortified about the idea of wearing a tennis skirt, and Amy loves bright colors. They outfitted us in the Tournament Sleeveless Polo and the Challenger Skort, which at $39, is an amazing price point. I really liked the top and liked the cut of the skirt, but the shorts under were a little short for me and creeped up a bit.
These kids’ shoes are TO DIE FOR. Gia, I’m kidnapping the Gs, ok?
Their tennis line came in colors as well as the traditional tennis whites.
Milos Raonic is one of their athletes. He’s 23, seeded 5th going into the U.S. Open, is 6’5”, and has a serve of 155 mph. Just slightly impressive.
We watched him serve a few times and then had the opportunity to chat with him a bit. DUDE PLAYS 10-11 HOURS PER DAY at the top of his training; otherwise he “only” plays 6-8 hours. Wow.
Who loves tennis? Who’s going to watch the Open? How am I going to watch without cable?
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what a fun visit! i like having tennis on while i'm on the couch recovering from long runs.
I"m sure playing tennis in grand central station is expensive…but I really want to do it! Also, you love great in tennis whites, in Minnesota its not that common to stick to the white, we usually wore as many crazy colors as possible. But our courts were near the football practice field….so there's that.
What an awesome day!! I just saw Raonic play Rodger Federer at the Cincinnati ATP Tennis Tournament. Even though Raonic lost (I mean, he day play RF!), his serve is incredible and a tremendous talent. I wish I was great at tennis...I love the game but haven't practiced enough to be stellar.
What a cool experience. I've learned to love New Balance through November Project, over the past couple of years. Also, I had no idea there was a tennis club over Grand Central - one of the hidden cool gems about NYC, from an outsiders point of view.
I've never gotten into tennis, but I want to! I don't know much about it, but I do enjoy watching it, I would love to go to the Open. And those kids shoes? Oh man, do you think I could squish my foot in there? They are amazing!
Hey-do you know if there's any way to get rid of some of the ads on your page when trying to read a post? The one for "veet" scrolled with me all the way to the bottom of the post, thus making it hard to read (and the pictures really hard to see since it covered the entire bottom of the screen). There wasn't a little "x" to get rid of it:-/. I know ads are important, but I thought you'd want to know that they're making the posts hard to read!
Hi! Sorry about that - let me look into it.
@Theodora Blanchfield: Thanks! For what it's worth, it apparently is specific to Chrome...I didn't have the same issue when I opened the post in Internet Explorer. Either way, thought you'd want to know!
That would be so cool to place tennis in a place like that, your so lucky :)
Adorable clothes and shoes.
How did I live in NYC for so long and not know there was a tennis court in GCS? Oh that's right, I don't play tennis at all! I wish I did though.
Never too late to start! :)