Get unlimited access to the latest travel industry news and analysis, comment on articles and sign up to newsletters.
Register for free
Already registered? Login here or below.
Having difficulty logging in? Try these tips, or contact support@flymy.co.uk
Clients inspired by Wimbledon? Why not sort them out with a tennis holiday, bathed in Florida sunshine, says Jo Kessel
I’m standing at the back of a tennis court with a ball spinning towards me when I’m overcome by stage fright. I swing my racket and try to channel my inner Serena.
What happens? I whack the ball into the net.
I’m tense because this isn’t any old court. I’m at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, west Florida, started by Nick Bollettieri nearly 40 years ago. Bollettieri is the only coach to produce 10 number one tennis players. Legends Andre Agassi, Pete Sampras, Boris Becker and Serena Williams are all former alumni who have graced the court I’m standing on. And now, thanks to a new tennis package holiday with America As You Like It, your clients (whatever level) can include a camp here as part or all of their trip.
My family and I have come to Florida for a week and we’ve booked a two-day tennis camp. My husband Marc and twins Nathalie and Gabriel, 13, are good players. Hannah, 11, is a novice and as for mum... hmm.
Coach Roger – one of a large team and himself one of the first students to attend the academy after opening in 1980 – feeds me another ball. I hit it wide into the tramlines and my next shot leaves the court altogether. “I’ve not played for a while,” I mumble, embarrassed.
But Roger is so chilled (in stark contrast to the Florida heat) that in no time I’m improving. He delivers each ball with an instruction: “Footwork; close your racket; kiss your bicep; fire it up.” While another Roger (my hero Federer) might not select me for a doubles partner quite yet, I can now hold my head high.
Unlike the children’s programme, which is positively heaving, there are only five adults in our 8am–3.30pm camp. The mood is relaxed, the crowd international and tuition well paced. We don’t (thankfully) play tennis for seven hours straight. Twenty-minute drills are followed by pit stops to rehydrate, and with two coaches for the five of us we enjoy top-notch one-on-one coaching.
Play is also interspersed with expert tutorials on topics such as rackets and what the Bollettieri Academy terms “mental conditioning”. Instruction on the latter is what sets this camp apart. All players – amateurs and pros – are taught how to be mentally tough. Ability to focus without hanging on to negativity is what turns a good player into a great player, a top seed into a champ.
Lunch fit for athletes is served at the clubhouse – barbecued chicken, diced potatoes, roasted cauliflower; no desserts. We dine on a terrace overlooking a swimming pool fringed by sun beds and I wish I’d booked myself half-day tennis (a viable option) instead of full. Your clients, like me, might prefer to rest poolside whilst the rest of the family plays on. And for non-tennis players there’s golf on-site too.
At the end of the afternoon we stroll around the campus’s 55 courts. We don’t spot Japan’s Kei Nishikori (ranked world number six) or Britain’s Heather Watson, who both train here, but we find all our children happily sparring with their American counterparts and thoroughly enjoying themselves.
Our base is a bright two-bedroom apartment in Shorewalk Vacation Villas, a condo five minutes drive from the academy. Round the corner is a large supermarket, where we buy an easy-to-cook dinner before conking out from all the exercise.
The next morning an even bigger treat is in store. At 84, Bollettieri is still hands-on. He watches our son in action. Gabriel’s groundstrokes are well-executed and brush the baseline. Will Bollettieri say he’s the next Andy Murray? No. He tells Gabriel to build up his legs.
This brief encounter with Bollettieri rubs off on me later. Roger feeds me an entire basket of balls – forehands, backhands and drop shots. I rally, slice and volley until my clothes are soggy; 99% of my shots are in. My inner Serena is found!
My twins would have preferred more tennis, but at the end of day two the rest of us are ready to move on. We’ve already discovered the area north-west of Bradenton. The academy is closed Sundays (the day after we arrived) so we lazed on the white beaches of Anna Maria Island.
Now we leave our condo and head 20 minutes south to Sarasota to check into luxury hotel the Resort at Longboat Key Club. Our stylish two-bedroom suite has a lounge, fully equipped kitchenette and a godsend washer/drier. We also have a gloriously long balcony and a view that is heaven – a large swimming pool, a sugary-white beach and the Gulf of Mexico’s turquoise water.
For three days I barely move except from poolside to seaside to the bar. By contrast my husband and twins make use of the hotel’s tennis courts, while daredevil Hannah has other ideas. Sarasota has a rich circus heritage and the Circus Arts Conservatory offers children’s drop-in classes. She attends an aerial sampler class ($25) and performs acrobatics in silks and on a static trapeze so proficiently I worry she might run away with the circus.
Sarasota has a hip west-coast vibe far different to that of Orlando and its theme parks, two hours away.
It also has an abundance of wildlife. We duck under overhanging branches on a mangrove tunnel kayak tour with Almost Heaven Kayak Adventures, but out in the open sea we get more than expected. Bottlenose dolphins and pelicans frolic close to our boats, and we spot manatees and handle live red sea urchins.
Facilities in the hotel’s 410-acre grounds are top notch: a spa, a private beach, two golf courses and kids’ clubs. Mostly we self-cater to keep costs down although we do treat ourselves a couple of times. Once to enjoy home-cooked dinner at Yoders restaurant, run by Sarasota’s small Amish community and famed for large portions of meatloaf and fried chicken.
And on our last night we go Italian, dining at Portofino, one of the hotel’s five restaurants. Calamari for starters, crispy-skin red snapper for mains (pasta for the brood) and warm apple bread pudding are memorable, served on a terrace overlooking a marina.
As the sun sets, we toast a holiday that had it all – an unrivalled tennis camp, beaches, circus, kayaking – all within a 20-minute radius of the airport and only $20 spent on petrol.
That’s why Cath Pusey, product director at America As You Like It, introduced this package. “Instead of lying on a beach for a week, families are looking for more experiential, activity-focused holidays. The Gulf Coast is a destination in its own right, rather than just an add-on to Orlando, and agents can easily upsell by finding out clients’ interests.”
Far from being exhausted by such an action-packed trip, we feel ready to take on the world and come home feeling like champs.
Book it: America As You Like It has a seven-night holiday to Bradenton and Sarasota, including return flights from Heathrow, via Atlanta to Sarasota, fully inclusive intermediate car hire, four nights’ self-catering at the Shorewalk Vacation Villas, three nights’ room-only at the Resort at Longboat Key and two-day tennis camps for two adults and three children from £7,860 based on two adults and two teenagers (12-15 yrs) and one child (under 12 years – NB tennis available for 8 and over).
