Welcome to e-tennis.org! Tennis has one of the most robust histories
of modern sports. While others such as baseball or basketball can claim
decades, perhaps a century of ancestry, tennis, which is also known
as lawn tennis stretches back more than twice that time period. In fact,
if you follow its lineage back to the game of real (or royal) tennis,
the game originated back in the 16th century. That’s more than
500 years that tennis has been played.
In modern tennis, unlike its ancient predecessor, you don’t need
to be of the nobility to play. In fact all you really need is a high
quality tennis racquet and some tennis balls. Most metropolitan areas
are equipped with open to the public courts. Since owning a court was
the major reason only the nobility practiced tennis in the first centuries
of its life, the range of players has greatly increased.
With the increase in players, a market opened up for the other basic
requirements for tennis. Tennis racquets especially became something
that manufacturers leapt on as a great market to invest in. As a result,
today we have racquets from such diverse manufacturers as Wilson,
Prince, Head,
Yonex, Babolat,
and other top
selling racquets.
Modern tennis has a professional season that lasts for 11 out of the
12 months of the year. The major stops along the way are the four major
competitions that make up the grand slams. These tournaments are the
Australian Open, The French Open, Wimbledon, and the US Open. They are
unevenly spaced, with the Australian Open happening in January, and
the other three tournaments happening in April-September. Interspersed
around these larger tournaments are a host of smaller invitational and
open tournaments. For example, in the month of March there are two tournaments
with around nine million dollars in prize money.
Of course, recreational play is an entirely different game than competitive
play. The goal isn’t necessarily just to win (although really,
who doesn’t play to win?) but also to relax and enjoy yourself
as well. There are even recreational leagues you can join that will
match you with players in your skill range so that you can both enjoy
a fun and challenging game.
Tennis, like golf, was historically a primarily white sport. Thankfully
the Williams sisters are doing for tennis what Tiger did for golf. They
play, and play well enough to beat anyone on any given day. Both Serena
and Venus have won major open titles, but their greatest contribution
to the sport comes in their leadership. Both sisters have been at the
forefront of the push to make compensation equal for male and female
tennis players. In 2007 the last of the major opens, Wimbledon and the
French Open, finally gave over and offered equal prize money for both
male and female competitors.
While we specialize in tennis racquets
here at e-tennis.org, they are not the only tennis equipment
we carry, we also have a full line of shoes,
balls and apparel
so that you can hit the court looking your absolute best.