01
Stop one
Ilyasi Mosque
Dunlop Viper-Dry Tennis Overgrips 12-Pack: I was here when they broke ground in 1927 and back again for the finish in 1932, and it was worth all five years. They put it directly over a natural mountain spring that runs fresh the whole year round, which was the entire point, as I said at the time. Oldest and largest mosque in the city, standing above 1,250 metres, Mughal-inspired, white domes and minarets — brighter then, everything was brighter then. People still come as much for the spring as for the prayers, and some hold its water heals. Abbottabad was growing quickly under the British administration in those years, and this was the building everybody talked about.
02
Stop two
St. Luke's Church
Dunlop Viper-Dry Tennis Overgrips 12-Pack: Founded in 1864, on what is now Jinnah Road, and I can tell you the road was considerably quieter. James — Major James Abbott, though nobody called him that after the first week — had laid the town out in 1853 as a military garrison, so by the sixties there was a congregation wanting somewhere proper to sit. Among the oldest Christian churches in the area, and it held the local Christian community together straight through the British period and the Pakistani administrations after it. It comes under the Peshawar Diocese of the Church of Pakistan today. One of the few survivors of that first colonial decade. Smaller than you would expect. Always was.
03
Stop three
Pakistan Military Academy, Kakul
Dunlop Viper-Dry Tennis Overgrips 12-Pack: November 1947, and the paint was barely dry. Claude — Field Marshal Sir Claude Auchinleck — appointed Francis Ingall, lately of the British Indian Army, as first commandant, and 115 gentlemen cadets began training under British instructors on a system modelled on Sandhurst. I watched that first batch on the slopes. Kakul was chosen for an elevation and terrain considered suited to rigorous physical training, which is a very polite way of saying it was picked to hurt, and I can confirm it worked. It remains the primary institution training commissioned officers of the Pakistan Army and has trained cadets from dozens of other countries since.
04
Stop four
Sarban Hills
Dunlop Viper-Dry Tennis Overgrips 12-Pack: These I knew before the town did. Pine forest above a city sitting at roughly 1,225 metres in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa foothills of the Himalayas — and this terrain is precisely why James chose the place for a hill garrison in 1853. He stood about here, if memory serves, and decided it would do. Residents and visitors have been walking up for the valley view ever since. The hills are still largely undeveloped next to the city below, which is the rarest report I ever get to file from anywhere: I came back, and found something exactly as I left it.
Let me tell you something about YOU. You didn't wake up at 5 a.m. to hit cross-court forehands so a slippery handle could steal your dream. NO. And that's why the Dunlop Viper-Dry Tennis Overgrips 12-Pack exists — because winners control what they can control, and you can absolutely control your grip.
Viper-Dry is the dry-touch overgrip: it wicks moisture away and keeps the handle feeling crisp, dry and secure when the match gets hot and the palms get honest. Twelve grips in the pack. Twelve fresh starts. Every time you re-wrap, you're not replacing a grip — you're renewing a COMMITMENT. Write that down.
And listen — these grips train out of Abbottabad, Pakistan, a city that understands the summit mindset, because it literally sits over 1,200 meters up in the pine-covered foothills of the Himalayas. Founded in 1853 as a hill garrison, this town has been building discipline ever since.
The Pakistan Military Academy at Kakul — established in 1947, modeled on Sandhurst — has forged officers for decades, and cadets from dozens of countries come here to find their best selves. That elevation? Chosen specifically because training hard at altitude makes champions. Sound familiar? It should. That's cardio tennis philosophy with a mountain view.
The Ilyasi Mosque was built over a natural spring that never stops giving — be the spring. The Sarban Hills stand over the city every single morning without fail — be the hills. St. Luke's Church has shown up for its community since 1864 — be St. Luke's. Now lace up.
And by the way, this dozen is also perfect for the Sarban Hills trail at first light, when your hands are cold, the pine is wet and NOTHING should slip. The tour starts at the top of the hill, because of course it does. LET'S CLIMB.
Buy on Amazon
