Tennis Participation Bounced Even Higher In 2021, Up 27.9% Since 2019

Last year saw yet another “net” increase in people playing tennis. The Physical Activity Council (PAC) has just served up their 2021 report on sports, fitness, and recreation participation in the U.S. And for a second year in a row, the results were smashing for tennis. Over 22.6 million people raised a racket last year, which was an upward bounce of about a million players or a 4.5% increase from 2020. Speaking of making a racket, a report from the Tennis Industry Association also revealed another positive swing in racket sales with 22.7% more rackets being sold for a 46.2% increase in sales dollars in 2021 compared to the year before. Assuming that one person didn’t buy 3.4 million rackets, this increase in racket sales was another sign that more and more people are now playing tennis.

That, of course, is good news if you are in the tennis industry and bad news if you happen to be a tennis ball. But it also may be very positive from a public health standpoint. Tennis can not only be a lot of fun (and a lot of pun), it can help people of all ages stay more physically active and socially and intellectually engaged as well. This would be especially important for the youth of America because didn’t Whitney Houston sing something about the children being our future? Dan Faber, Chief Executive of the United States Tennis Association (USTA) Foundation, described how tennis can “keep kids active and engaged. Close to 14 million youth live in poverty. Close to 75% of crimes are committed by high school dropouts. There is also the childhood obesity issue. These are things that the USTA Foundation can focus on.”

Last July, I already reported for Forbes how tennis had successfully courted around four million new players (for a 22% increase) during the first year of the pandemic. With social distancing in place in 2020, tennis offered everyone a way to get exercise and social interaction while remaining at least one Federer (because Roger Federer is a little over six feet tall) away from each other. Apparently, that’s how many people saw 2020, so to speak. And such momentum seemed to carry into 2021. Over the two year period from 2019 through 2021, tennis has experienced a 27.9% boom in participation, adding around 4.9 million players. That’s an impressive return for a sport that not too long ago seemed to be on the downswing in the U.S.

While the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and its yucky spike proteins may have contributed to this recent spike in tennis participation, don’t overlook the continuing efforts of the USTA Foundation and the tennis community in general to break down barriers to playing. Despite what the sport can offer, over the years one stereotype has been weighing tennis down like a sweater vest made out of sandbags: the perception has been that tennis is somehow only a sport for the elites, the wealthy. Sure, tennis equipment and court time can often seem pricey, too pricey for those who don’t have more resources. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. The USTA Foundation has been trying to change that image. Faber explained that his “charge is to make sure that underrepresented communities have more access to tennis.”

One the backbones of increasing tennis participation has been the National Junior Tennis and Learning (NJTL) network. As described by the USTA Foundation website, this network “features more than 250 nonprofit youth development organizations that offer free or low-cost tennis and education programming to over 160,000 under-resourced youth each year.” Despite the pandemic affecting many things across society including closing parks and recreation fields at some point and making toilet paper at times ridiculously difficult to find, “no NJTL chapters closed their doors since the beginning of the pandemic and 35 new chapter affiliates were added [in 2021],” according to Faber.

And one of these new NJTL chapters added was the first one to be completely youth-led. William Sun, now a college student at Johns Hopkins University, founded the Dublin Tennis Outreach Program (Dublin TOP) as a high school student and has since passed the reins on to Isaac Frank, currently a senior in High School. In the following Dublin TOP video, Sun described the program:

After seeing how another high school didn’t have the resources for current and would-be tennis players, Sun “wanted to teach tennis to kids and give back,” in his words. “We got an initial donation of equipment, tennis rackets and red foam balls. There were 10 or so consistent students. I really got to know a lot of the kids.” That eventually led him to forming Dublin TOP as a 501(c) organization, all as a high school student.

If you think that the NJTL chapters are simply about teaching tennis and finding the next Serena Williams, you’d be wrong, wrong as the 2011 song “Friday.” The NJTIL chapters have incorporated general educational and preparation for life programs into their tennis instruction as well. Although this network has helped develop players such as Washington, D.C. native Robin Montgomery, who in 2021 became the first player in 17 years to win both the junior girls’ singles and doubles titles at the U.S. Open, it’s been more about preparing youth for their next steps in life.

Speaking of next steps, another initiative of the USTA Foundation is about connecting kids closer to the world of higher education. During 2021 via the USTA’s Collegiate Community Hub programs, the USTA Foundation partnered various NJTL chapters with 12 different universities such as Michigan State University, University of Arizona, University of South Carolina, University of Alabama, and St. Thomas University. This allowed the NJTL programs to use the universities’ facilities for their programming. In turn, youth could get earlier exposure to collegiate settings and college students, faculty, and coaches so that they don’t think that going to college is like what the movie Old School portrayed. Of course, going to college requires money. So, in 2021, the USTA Foundation awarded over $441,000 in college scholarships to 47 students as well. “The more kids see success stories, the better,” Faber explained. “These programs can show how tennis can be combined with education.”

Another 2021 initiative has been helping fundraise to build the Carol Kimmelman Athletic and Academic Campus. This will be a 25,000 square-foot Learning Center built on 87 acres of land in Carson, California, right in the heart of Los Angeles. The facilities will include nearly 50 tennis courts, five full-size soccer fields, and various other multipurpose athletic facilities to provide academic and athletic programs for under-resourced youth and families. The campus will bear the name of Kimmelman, a former member of the University of Southern California (USC) tennis team that won the NCAA championship in 1983 who tragically passed away from cancer in 2017. “[Carol Kimmelman’s] family pledged an eight-digit donation to build the campus,” Faber said. Faber also mentioned others such as TGR Foundation, which is Tiger Woods’ Foundation, AEG, and the LA Galaxy who are working with the USTA Foundation to help make the Campus a reality.

This USTA Foundation video describes Kimmelman’s legacy and plans for the Campus:

According to Faber, “the ribbon cutting with occur in 2022 with groundbreaking in 2023.”

Could this year, 2022, be a 2020-too for tennis in a good way? In other words, will the tennis community be able to continue the momentum generated during the first year of the pandemic? Faber sees continued growth, expecting to “bring on another 30 locations” as NJTL chapters. “The USTA Foundation Board has really stepped up, opening doors to talk to other people,” he added. “[tennis legend] Chris Evert, the board chair, has played a huge role.” Indeed, they’ve managed to string together quite of few successes in recent years. Perhaps 2022 will keep moving the saying “tennis, anyone” more and more towards “tennis everyone.”