It doesn’t matter whether you’re a seasoned tennis professional with years of experience behind you, or if you’re a complete tennis newb looking to put that dusty old tennis racket in the back of the wardrobe to good use, tennis is a sport for everybody.
Without a doubt, tennis is the world’s most popular racket sport. It’s undergone some evolution over the centuries, yet at its core, it is just as popular now as it was during the reign of King Henry VIII.
When people think of tennis, they think of pristine white tennis gear, blue skies, glorious sunshine, strawberries and cream, and some of the most advanced tennis courts and playing surfaces that money can buy. Tennis can be about that, but at the same time, it can also be about playing on a damp and gloomy day on a beaten-down old concrete court with a few pals or family members. It isn’t about the setting, it’s about the game and the experience, which is part of what we’re talking about today.
If you’ve decided you’re ready to hit the courts and work on your serve, here’s a look at several amazing benefits of playing tennis that you cannot overlook.
Physical Health Benefits of Tennis
The great thing about tennis is the fact that it offers so many benefits in so many different ways. There are mental health benefits, social benefits, and of course, physical health benefits associated with playing tennis.
To kick (or should that be to ‘serve’) things off today, we’ll begin by listing some of the most prominent physical health benefits associated with tennis.
1. Weight Loss
Let’s face it, unless you’re particularly lucky, chances are you’ll have struggled with your weight at some point in your life.
Life can be particularly cruel and unfair at times, which is why a bacon double cheeseburger with fries tastes like heaven, and steamed cod with broccoli tastes like bland cardboard. Okay, maybe that’s a bit of an overreaction, but generally speaking, healthy foods are nowhere near as tasty or desirable to us as high-calorie ones.
While we all deserve a treat now and then, too many treats can pile on those stubborn pounds, which is where sport and physical exercise proves to be so useful.
If you want to shift a few pounds but can’t face heading to the gym, why not play a game of tennis instead?
Tennis is great cardio that not only burns calories but also works your muscles. The resistance benefits of tennis, combined with the cardiovascular benefits make tennis one of the best activities for burning calories.
One hour of moderate-intensity tennis can potentially burn off as many as 450 – 600 calories. Ramp up the intensity and this number will be closer to 900 calories.
So, if you overindulged over the holidays, or simply want to drop a few belt sizes before an upcoming social event, tennis is one of the best sports you could wish for.
2. Tennis is Great for Endurance
Tennis is a sport requiring good endurance and physical fitness, so it should come as no surprise to learn that the more tennis you play, the greater your endurance and fitness levels will become.
Tennis is a fast-paced game that requires a great deal of running back and forth along the length of your half of the court. This constant running is not only a great form of cardio (more on that later) but it is also great for working on your stamina and endurance.
Tennis players have been found to have an impressive aerobic capacity, which basically means that they can exercise harder, and for longer durations of time before they begin to tire and suffer from fatigue.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re training for a marathon, or if you just want to be able to go hiking in the countryside with your family or friends without getting winded and gasping for breath like a fish out of water, tennis is an activity which is perfect for working on stamina and endurance.
3. Tennis Improves Overall Health
Tennis has been scientifically proven to provide a myriad of health benefits in a number of different ways.
To begin with, as tennis is such a great form of cardio, it’s great for the heart. The ancient Greek word for heart was actually ‘Kardia’ which is where the word ‘cardio’ comes from. Needless to say, cardiovascular exercise such as tennis is fantastic for anybody trying to look after their heart.
As heart disease claims more lives each year than any other disease, the importance of looking after the heart really becomes obvious, and tennis can certainly help.
Tennis helps to reduce blood pressure, thereby lowering the risk of hypertension (high blood pressure) which in itself can be fatal and can be a precursor for numerous health issues including stroke, heart attack, and kidney failure.
Studies have found that three hours of tennis each week can reduce a person’s risk of heart disease by as much as 56%. Tennis can reduce a person’s resting heart rate, reduce blood pressure, and even reduce harmful LDL cholesterol.
Obesity is another health issue linked with many potentially fatal chronic health conditions, and as tennis can burn off hundreds of calories, it’s a sport that’s perfect for burning fat, and improving a person’s health in the process.
4. Great for Toning the Muscles
People often focus on the cardiovascular and fitness benefits of tennis, and while tennis does certainly provide these for players, you should also not underestimate the muscle-toning benefits of tennis.
Don’t worry, playing tennis won’t suddenly transform you into a hulking musclebound monster who would make a prime Arnie look like a scrawny dweeb, but what it will do is help to gently tone your muscles as you play.
When you play tennis, you’re using a wide range of muscles, not only to quickly propel yourself from one part of the court to another, but also to strike the ball with your racket.
Each time you make a serve, return a volley, perform a backhand volley, or any other type of stroke, you’re using your muscles. In particular, muscles in the back, shoulders, arms, and core are used during tennis, which is why pro tennis players such as Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, and the Williams sisters all have physiques that look like they’ve been sculpted out of granite.
The more muscles you use, the harder they’re worked and the leaner and more defined they will look. If you’re looking to get your beach body ready for summer this year and strut your stuff proudly in the sun, be sure to include plenty of tennis in your weekly exercise routine.
Obviously, tennis doesn’t work miracles, so if your diet does consist of fatty foods, beer and soda, and other calorific treats, don’t expect to have a body like Zeus by summer, just because you and your buddies play a game of tennis once or twice a week.
Mental Health Benefits of Tennis
It isn’t just the physical health benefits of tennis that we need to focus on, we also need to look at the mental health benefits too.
Over the last couple of years especially, the importance of looking after your mental health is more obvious than ever. With as many as one in four people estimated to suffer from a mental health disorder at some point in their lives, we must act now, rather than later.
Here are just a few ways in which tennis can improve a person’s mental health.
1. Tennis Can Lift Your Mood
Tennis, and indeed any other sport or physical activity for that matter, has been proven to lift a person’s mood.
To begin with, tennis has been found to help promote the production and secretion of happy chemicals in the body, known as endorphins. Studies have found that exercise and sporting activity can cause the body to produce and release more endorphins into the system. Endorphins cause us to feel happy, relaxed, confident, and content, making them ideal for your mood.
If you’re feeling a bit down in the dumps, or if you just need a bit of a happiness boost, a few games of tennis played each week will do wonders for your mood.
2. Improving Your Concentration
It isn’t just your mood that will benefit from you playing tennis. Tennis has also been found to significantly improve a person’s overall levels of concentration.
When you play tennis, concentration is key because you need to concentrate on your opponent and on the ball. Not only do you need to focus on where the ball is coming from, but you need to concentrate on where it’s going as well.
Regular physical activity such as playing tennis has been found to keep a person’s mental skills sharp, particularly as you age. If you find that your memory is suffering and your concentration levels are lagging, playing tennis a few times a week will soon have your brain firing on all cylinders once again.
3. Tennis Can Help Promote Sleep
Few things in life can be fixed with a good night’s sleep, which is one of the main reasons why we feel so awful when we’re sleep-deprived.
A lack of sleep can leave us feeling more irritable than a bear with a sore backside, and snappier than an alligator under extra pressure at work. Not only can a lack of sleep leave us feeling irritable and moody, but it can also drain our motivation levels and leave us feeling tired and lethargic.
If you struggle to get a good night’s sleep, playing tennis a few times each week could help turn things around drastically.
To start with, exercise such as tennis has been found to promote the production of hormones such as serotonin, melatonin, and dopamine, which all play key roles in regulating relaxation and promoting feelings of tiredness and relaxation.
As if that wasn’t enough, because of the fact that tennis is so physically demanding, thanks to all of that energy you’re expending chasing after the ball and striking the ball, the more energy you burn off the more tired you’ll feel and the easier you’ll find it to drift off into the land of nod.
Social Benefits of Tennis
Finally, last but by no means least, we have the social benefits of tennis. After the couple of years we’ve all had, one thing we have found is that social interaction with other people can work wonders for us mentally and spiritually. If you’re looking to meet new people, or simply expand your social life, here’s a look at some key social benefits of tennis.
1. Improved Social Skills
Tennis is a sport which cannot be played alone. If you wish to play a game of tennis, you’ll play against an opponent, or opponents if you’re playing doubles.
By playing tennis with other people you are developing and improving your social skills as you’ll be interacting with them before, during, and after the match.
2. Make New Friends
Another social benefit of tennis is simply the fact that it enables players to make new friends.
If you’re looking to make new friends, why not join up with a local tennis club and meet new people that way? Tennis clubs are great because you get to meet new people who share the same interests as you, so right off the bat (or should that be racket?) you have something in common and have an ice breaker.
