GLTA - The worlds best gay sports league

Just over 4 years ago I took my first tennis lesson. I was looking for a new hobby. I had played a few times with my SBF (Sober Best Friend) Patrick Turner. It had peeked my curiosity enough to try to learn how to play correctly, and give me something acgive to do, as Covid was taking a beating on my waste line.

I instantly fell in love with tennis. I was able to get a lot of instruction at The Guilford Racquet Club (thanks Sarah) along with private coaching (Thanks Pat) and started to improve.

But it was a conversation with my best long term friend Jim Zagres that led me to the GLTA.

Ever since I lost John 3 years prior to tennis, I had been searching for ways to meet healthy gay men. Jim suggested I look for a gay tennis league, and I stumbled upon the GLTA.

The GLTA is a worldwide tennis organization for the LGBTIA community that sponsors tournaments all throughout the world. There are roughly 15,000 players worldwide and we compete in divisions based upon skill.

A tournament typically lasts 3 days, occurs in a gay friendly city, and consists of playing a shitload of tennis. The better you do during the tournament, the more you play. If you play both singles and doubles you are going to play at least 3 matches in the weekend. If you do well, you can play up to 8 matches in a weekend.

Besides the tennis we also have a welcome party, a player party, and various other social activities.

And folks, we do this right. We play at the US Open, Roland Garros, Wimbledon and Australian Open venues. We play in magical places, beautiful settings and have really fun parties. About 30 Percent of players travel to multiple cities. Those of us that are fortunate enough to be able to travel have a community to travel with, and welcoming locals in every spot.

I have met wonderful people along the way. Charlie, Frank, Ben, Ken, James, Huey, Jack, Michael, Antonio, Wilson, Leo, Ernesto, and I am missing tons of names. I also have been welcomed by amazing tournament directors throughout the world. You guys rock. I have also met some guys along the way that have peeked other types on interest. I will keep their names out of this blog post to protect their identities!!

My mantel is getting a little full these days, and I look forward to adding more hardware. More importantly, my life has been getting full by meeting quality people, going to great cities, and challenging myself physically with such a great game.

My first two tournaments in Australia have not been very successful from a winning standpoint, but each tournament was on a surface I had never p[layed upon before. The next 2 tournaments are on clay (which I’m not a big fan of playing on) and hard court (my favorite). I would love to bring home some hardware from the trip, but I will enjoy myself either way.