Tennis doesn’t have to feel exclusive or overly serious to be a real workout. We’re joined by Michele Krause to share the vision behind National Hit To Be Fit Weekend (May 15 to 17), a nationwide celebration that pairs National Tennis Month with a simple idea: make the court feel like a party and make it easy for anyone to say yes. Think music under the lights, big group energy, and a format that welcomes the person who has never played alongside the 4.0 who wants a sweat.
For more information on all things Cardio Tennis and National Hit to be Fit Weekend visit: http://Linktr.ee/cardiotennis
Register to host a Hit to be Fit event at: www.cardiotennisinstructor.com
Here are links to our past episodes with Michele:
Ep. 144: Cardio Tennis – the Right Way to Play Triples
Ep. 145: Cardio Tennis Can Make You The Biggest Loser Too!
Here’s a complete transcript of our conversation with Michele Krause:
Carolyn 0:07
Hi, this is Carolyn and I’m here with Erin and we are excited to have Michele Krause back on the podcast. We had her, what was it, Erin? 2022. I think it was 2022 to discuss cardio tennis. So we are thrilled to have you back on. Thanks for coming back on, Michelle. So so excited to be back with you gals and to discuss our topic for today. Yeah. Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about the topic, which is National Hit to Be Fit Weekend? I would love to.
Red Ball Triples And Inclusivity
Michele 0:36
So National Hit to Be Fit weekend is May 15th through the 17th. Now, this will be the third year that we’re doing National Hit to Be Fit. It is in conjunction with National Tennis Month. So I’m not sure if everybody knows that National Tennis Month exists, but it does, and it has existed for a very long time. And we’ve done a much better job, and I would say the last three to four years of embracing that and doing the things that we should be doing around that month. So Hit to Be Fit was a concept that I came up with because I love big events and I like lots of people and music and it should be a party on the court. So I’m like, let’s do uh let’s do National Hit to Be Fit Day. And in of course, my um thinking very big blonde brain. Uh it started as, okay, we’re gonna do this big event at Lake Nona at the US T national campus, you know, and we’re gonna have, you know, 20 courts of, you know, cardio tennis going on. And then I thought to myself, well, yeah, we can do that, but it should be bigger than that. Like ever like everybody in Florida should be doing that. Okay. And then I thought, no, everybody across the country should be doing that. And uh then I’m like, okay, we’re gonna have 300 locations across the country all doing the same thing on the same day. All right, so there was my vision. And we’ve had quite a bit of success um these last two years. And so the mission of National Hit to Be Fit Weekend is that one, we are celebrating tennis and all its health and wellness benefits. And we are also trying to unite the tennis industry on one day more or less. So the first two years it was Hit to Be Fit Day. And this year for our event, we looked usually at Lake Nona, we do it on a Saturday or a Sunday morning. And for this year, we felt we wanted to do it on a Friday night. So we will be under the lights. And because of that, um, knowing knowing our facilities across the country, not all of them would be able to do something on a Friday, Friday night on a big scale. So we made the decision that would be National Hit to Be Fit weekend as opposed to National Hit to Be Fit Day. Okay, so so a facility, you can be a country club, you can be a commercial facility, you could be a public park, you can be a CTA. You can schedule your event anytime Friday, Saturday, Sunday over that weekend. Love it. All right, I just talked a lot. Do you have any last thoughts on that?Carolyn 3:34
I I had the question. So, what are people doing during the okay? Yeah, so that’s great, Michelle. Hit to be fit. What does that mean?Erin 3:42
What does it mean? What does it mean? All right, so I heard uh Friday night party as well.Michele 3:47
Yeah, and we’re and we’re I’m gonna talk more about the Friday night party too, okay? So obviously I manage cardio tennis, and we know that cardio tennis is um a great way to get new tennis participants into our sport. Um, we also have adult red ball, okay, which is also one of the easiest entry points to get people into our sport. And so I’m about growing the game. Um, I am about all ability levels and fitness levels playing together and being inclusive. So the event itself is a little bit of adult red ball. And then our favorite game in the world, cardio tennis triples. Yes. Yeah. So Carol and I love triples, right? We do now. Yeah.Carolyn 4:36
Now that you now that you know the right way to play, right? Yeah, because I had played previously with a regular ball, and Michelle told us that was wrong. That’s wrong. Yeah. Because people were just getting nailed left and right. And then with the orange ball, it’s perfect.Michele 4:49
It’s perfect, yeah. So when you take the context of the red and the orange ball and um cardio tennis programming, again, we’re going to hit to be fit. And whether you’re a new player to the sport or you’re an experienced higher level athlete, everybody is gonna play with and against each other in this event format.Erin 5:14
So that is my favorite ball, is the red ball, actually. I love the red ball. But yeah, that ball, we actually, Carolyn and I last summer um did a triples event um together. It was so hot, but it was super fun. And there were all different levels, like you said. And I actually learned from you when we had you on in 2022, which will link your other old episodes back, you know, after um in our show notes, um, so people can go back and listen to that. But I think I learned then that you can mix all different levels. And we certainly had that in our event. And that’s what makes it fun, is it kind of doesn’t matter if you’re just beginning or you’re advanced, because that ball, I think you said it kind of levels the playing field for people. So I love that. Anyone like any of our listeners should be asking their friends to just come out, even if you usually get into tennis as an adult by having a friend just say, Come out and hit, just try it. We’ve had so many people that are now high-level tennis players start in their 40s and 50s just because their friend said, just come out and hit with me, just try it, give it a try. It’s fun, whatever. Um, and this is a perfect event for people to get started and ask their friends to come to an event like this because even if they don’t think they can hit a tennis ball, they’ll be able to. And it sounds like it’s gonna be a party.
How To Run The Party Format
Michele 6:26
So yeah, a party. Again, it’s it’s a it’s a red and orange ball event. Uh, music should be blaring. You want big numbers, okay? So if you if one is hosting this event, you really want to do this on a minimum of three courts with a minimum of 18 athletes. Okay, when you get down to two courts, it’s just not the same vibe, the same energy. Um, you can’t do the rotations as well. We have marketing collateral pieces for our facilities to use, sizzle video flyers, social media graphics to promote their event. We even have a short online course that’s everything’s free for the organizers to watch the the online so they learn how to actually run the vet the event. We don’t we don’t want people making up something. Okay, like we’re pretty, this is like this is this is what hit to be fit is. And it it is this because it is proven and we know it works, and you don’t need a coach for every court. There’s there is zero ball feeding in this event. Not one ball is fed. It is all partner interaction, and or in triples, the athlete is putting the ball into play. Okay, so you don’t need a lot of staff. You want to have great, you know, nightclub music going on. You could do fun things like if you want to do shirts for your participants, we’ll give you our hit to be fit logo. You can add food and beverage to it, etc. So, and you want to run the event um in the 90 to 20, excuse me, 90 minutes to two hours. Okay, it should not be more than two hours. 90 minutes is actually the perfect amount. Our Lake Nona event, we’re we’re pretty fancy with this one. So we have an amazing audio company and they set up an incredible sound system throughout the 20 courts. Okay, so the music is just incredible. And then we have a partner called Fit Radio. They are the leader in the group fitness music space from a uh in an app standpoint. And last year they create they curated two unique mixes for our event. So anybody that’s doing this event across the country will also have access to that music. Okay, so not only are we doing the same general activity, but hopefully we’re all listening to that party uh techno nightclub music. At Lake Nona, the Lake Nona Mascot Rally will be making an appearance. Um, there is a mascot. And then there will also be the debut of the new campus cocktail. Okay, which I have to keep under wraps because it’s still secret. Oh, it’s a secret.Carolyn 9:26
It’s a secret cocktail.Erin 9:27
I love that we have signature cocktails for all the events now.
How To Host And Register
Michele 9:31
It’s very signature cocktail. Yes. So anybody that’s listening around the country, you are very welcome to join us at Lake Nona. Okay. I mean, you don’t have to live in you know, Orlando, Lake Nona. Please, you know, make the trip. I think it’ll be worth it. Plus, you can see the UST National Campus. Um, registration for that should be live in a couple weeks. But in the meantime, um, anybody can go to uh LinkTree backslash cardio tennis to find all the information.Carolyn 10:01
Okay, so if we wanted to take do this here in North Carolina where we’re located, do we ask our CTA? Do we ask our pro? How do we do this if we want to be a part of this event? Exactly.Michele 10:13
And I’m hoping that your listeners um are a little excited about this and think, oh yeah, I would like to, I would like to do this here. So please, yes, speak to your um your racket staff, your tennis staff. Tell them that you heard about this. Uh you know, you as a member client would like to be involved. And then all they need to do is go to cardiotenisinstructor.com and they click on a link and they’re registering their site. So I need sites to register, right? Because the that’s the only way I know who’s participating. And my goal for this year is 300 locations across the country. All right. So we’re gonna help you get that. Thank you.Erin 10:54
Because Carol and I are both gonna do one at our club. Yes, we got two more already, right? We’re gonna force, yeah, we’re gonna force our pros. Yep. Um, so do you need, like, for instance, we at my club, we do uh our pros run like Friday night mixers. Yep. At least once a month, sometimes twice a month. So do they just need to say, like, I’m gonna have four courts and X amount of participants? They don’t have to actually register people’s names. No. Good.Michele 11:19
Correct. So all they’re doing when they register is they’re putting in their their name and their club and their email, and it’s just saying we’re participating as a host. Okay. And then when they do that, they get access to all the resources. Okay. So the marketing pieces, the education, they’ll get updates on things that are happening on that they would want to know about as we lead up to the big event.Erin 11:42
Okay, great. Yeah. Yeah. I’m gonna, I’m gonna force this on my club this week. Because it’s a party. It sounds like so much fun.Michele 11:51
So if you know, even if you talk, if um, if you’re a listener and you talk to your tennis coach and they don’t want to do it in May, I would, or they can’t for because of scheduling purposes, ask them to do it another time. So it doesn’t have to be that particular weekend, although it would help my numbers.
Players Can Run It Too
Erin 12:08
Right. We have a goal. We have a goal. I have a question. This might sound strange, but could I run? I’m not a coach. I’m a four-o mediocre, four-o player, but like there’s a um, we have some pretty social people at our club that sometimes they just go, we’re gonna get together again, you know, Friday night, Saturday night, whatever. I have four courts booked, who who can be out there? But again, like you said, that becomes a the numbers have to be even or someone’s sitting out, or um, and when you first said, I’m gonna go back to what you said several minutes ago about it being a 90 minute to a two hour event, I was thinking, that doesn’t sound long enough. But when you’re doing cardio tennis and hit to be fit, like Carol and I learned this summer, and it was scorching hot when we did it. Yep, you’re like people are like, I’ll sit out, yeah, you know. Um, but could I run it as like just a social, you know, if I had like however many. I mean, I could easily get 20 to 25 people on courts on a Friday night if I could, you know, if I have enough courts to book at my club. Is that something that I could just do if I didn’t have someone? Absolutely. Oh good. Oh, good, okay.Michele 13:07
In my world, I can’t rely on tennis staff all the time because they’re very busy, understandably so. So, yes, um, people like yourselves who love tennis, who have some good tennis knowledge, we we encourage you, actually strongly encourage you to run this type of an event. And that’s why I was so focused on making sure there was education so that as a you know, non-tennis teaching person, that you could review that education and you would know exactly what to do. Okay, giving you the tools, the agendas right there. There’s an agenda, it’s broken down in time hacks. It’s very self-explanatory. So again, listen, listeners out there, if you’re, you know, whatever level you are, if you like to organize things, if you have energy, if you like bringing groups of people together, you do not have to rely on tennis staff to make this happen.Erin 14:13
That’s really good to know. Because there are, I mean, there’s also a lot of groups, you know, just outside USTA that are just social people that get together and play. So this would be something great for them to run. And you could run it at your club. I know. Even if you can’t get your your pro involved.Carolyn 14:27
Yeah, and even I have neighbors that don’t play tennis, but they could play this.Erin 14:32
Yes.Carolyn 14:32
So, you know, or this could be a good leadway into it. It’s a good segue. Is that it doesn’t matter if you just starting or you’re a 4-0, everybody can play together. Right, which is really nice.Michele 14:43
And I’m here to support anybody, all right. So, again, listeners, if this is something that’s interesting you to you and you go to cardio tennis instructor.com and you register, um, I’m I’m very available and accessible be via email and text, and I would be more than happy to help anybody walk them through this.
Carolyn 15:06
Thanks to Michelle for coming on the podcast. We’ve included a link where you can find more information on all things cardio tennis and national hit to be fit weekend. We have one more episode with Michelle where we discuss why everyone should be using a red, orange, or green ball, whether you are a two-five or Roger Federer. So we hope you check that out. Thanks so much for listening and hope to see you on the courts soon. Thanks to Michelle for coming on the podcast. We’ve included links in our show notes where you can learn more about National Hit to Be Fit weekend, or you can register to host a hit to be fit event. Also, we discuss why everyone should be using the red ball, the orange ball, or the green ball, whether you are a 2 5 beginner or Roger Federer. So we hope you check that out. Thanks so much for listening and hope to see you on the courts soon.