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THE TENNIS TACTICIAN, LLC

Themed Cardio Tennis Clinics in the Fort Lauderdale Area

cardio tennis classes 33019 — the Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet combined with the national flag of Lebanon
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Byblos Castle in Byblos, A squat honey-limestone keep about three storeys high on a low mound at the landward edge of the archaeological site, ringed by a roughly square curtain wall with square corner towers and a dry moat. Its masonry is unmistakable: enormous re-used Roman granite and marble column drums are laid horizontally through the lower courses like stone logs, cutting grey-pink stripes across the pale limestone blocks. From its roof the view runs west over the excavated temple field to the Mediterranean, with the medieval walled town and the old souk immediately east
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Church of Saint John-Mark in Byblos, A compact Romanesque church of warm honey-coloured limestone with a low pitched roof, three semicircular apses projecting at the east end, and small round-arched windows deep-set in thick walls. It stands just east of the castle inside the medieval town. Its signature feature is a free-standing open-air baptistery built against the north wall, a small square canopy of four arches carrying a shallow dome, open on every side. A slender square bell tower stands at one corner, and a paved forecourt with old trees fronts it
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Temple of the Obelisks in Byblos, A rectangular open-air stone enclosure with waist- to chest-high walls of rough grey-beige limestone, filled with dozens of standing stone obelisks: plain, tapering, unpolished shafts roughly half a metre to two metres tall, planted upright in irregular rows on a bed of pale gravel and dry grass. It sits in the excavated Phoenician sanctuary area west of the castle, on open ground with the castle keep behind it and the Mediterranean beyond. No roof and no shade, only bleached stone, reddish earth and hard sunlight
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Roman Theatre of Byblos in Byblos, A small semicircular theatre of pale limestone on a terrace at the seaward western edge of the site, set directly above the Mediterranean so that open sea fills the whole background. Only about five tiers of curved seating survive, low to the ground. Behind the orchestra stands a short colonnade of six slim white columns with simple capitals carrying no entablature, reading as a bare row of uprights against the water. A circular panel of dark stone marks the centre of the orchestra floor, and grass grows between the blocks
cardio tennis classes 33019 — the Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet combined with the national flag of Lebanon

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet

Byblos, Lebanon  ·  Racquets > Adult

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet

This one is for a shoulder that has run out of patience: a lucent 112-inch oversize head, extended length, feather-weight, pre-strung, giving depth off a swing that need not be big. Nothing should work harder than it was made to. First, though — Byblos, and seven thousand years of people declining to leave.

↓   Tour Byblos, Lebanon

Four stops before the checkout

Byblos, Lebanon
01
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Byblos Castle in Byblos, A squat honey-limestone keep about three storeys high on a low mound at the landward edge of the archaeological site, ringed by a roughly square curtain wall with square corner towers and a dry moat. Its masonry is unmistakable: enormous re-used Roman granite and marble column drums are laid horizontally through the lower courses like stone logs, cutting grey-pink stripes across the pale limestone blocks. From its roof the view runs west over the excavated temple field to the Mediterranean, with the medieval walled town and the old souk immediately east
Stop one

Byblos Castle

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet: Everyone stops here and says Crusader castle as though that settles it. Look at the stone. Indigenous limestone, yes, and the remains of Roman structures built straight into the walls, because they used what was lying about, which is very Byblos. Built in the twelfth century, it was the seat of the Genoese Embriaco family, Lords of Gibelet from 1100 to the late thirteenth century, and it is regarded as the finest surviving example of the twelfth-century plan combining a walled castrum with a central donjon. Saladin captured town and castle in 1188 and partially dismantled the walls in 1190; the Crusaders recaptured Byblos in 1197 and rebuilt. In 1369 it repelled an attack by Cypriot vessels from Famagusta. It houses the site museum now.

02
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Church of Saint John-Mark in Byblos, A compact Romanesque church of warm honey-coloured limestone with a low pitched roof, three semicircular apses projecting at the east end, and small round-arched windows deep-set in thick walls. It stands just east of the castle inside the medieval town. Its signature feature is a free-standing open-air baptistery built against the north wall, a small square canopy of four arches carrying a shallow dome, open on every side. A slender square bell tower stands at one corner, and a paved forecourt with old trees fronts it
Stop two

Church of Saint John-Mark

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet: The guidebooks say Saint John Mark and stop, which is the wrong end of the story. Construction began in 1115, during the Crusader period, and the building was originally dedicated to Saint John the Baptist, serving as the cathedral church of Gibelet. An earthquake in 1170 partially destroyed it. It was subsequently given to the Maronite bishop, and today it functions as the Maronite cathedral of Jbeil, dedicated to Saint John Mark, traditionally held to have founded the first Christian community at Byblos and the town's patron saint. The architecture is Romanesque of the type the Franks brought east, executed entirely in local limestone, local being the word people skip. And it is still a working parish and cathedral.

03
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Temple of the Obelisks in Byblos, A rectangular open-air stone enclosure with waist- to chest-high walls of rough grey-beige limestone, filled with dozens of standing stone obelisks: plain, tapering, unpolished shafts roughly half a metre to two metres tall, planted upright in irregular rows on a bed of pale gravel and dry grass. It sits in the excavated Phoenician sanctuary area west of the castle, on open ground with the castle keep behind it and the Mediterranean beyond. No roof and no shade, only bleached stone, reddish earth and hard sunlight
Stop three

Temple of the Obelisks

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet: Now here is the thing visitors get wrong, and it is a large one: this temple is not standing where it was built. It went up between about 1600 and 1200 BC directly on top of an earlier L-shaped temple, and because it sat over that older building the archaeologists dismantled it and moved it a short distance to the spot you are looking at, so the earlier structure could be excavated. Same stones, different address. The many small obelisks that give it its name were set up as religious offerings, and excavation of the sanctuary produced bronze figurines covered in gold leaf, now in the National Museum of Beirut. That work belongs to Maurice Dunand's Byblos campaign, begun in 1925 and running some four decades.

04
cardio tennis classes 33019 — Roman Theatre of Byblos in Byblos, A small semicircular theatre of pale limestone on a terrace at the seaward western edge of the site, set directly above the Mediterranean so that open sea fills the whole background. Only about five tiers of curved seating survive, low to the ground. Behind the orchestra stands a short colonnade of six slim white columns with simple capitals carrying no entablature, reading as a bare row of uprights against the water. A circular panel of dark stone marks the centre of the orchestra floor, and grass grows between the blocks
Stop four

Roman Theatre of Byblos

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet: This one has been moved as well, which nobody mentions while they are photographing the sea behind it. It dates from around AD 218 and originally stood inland, between the site's east gate and the large L-shaped temple, and it was considerably bigger than what you see: only about a third survives of a structure standing some twenty metres high with thirty tiers. In the 1930s Maurice Dunand dismantled it and rebuilt it in its present position by the sea so the ground beneath could be excavated. Its floor carried a mosaic depicting Bacchus, since transferred to the National Museum in Beirut, with dark stones now marking where it lay. Byblos was inscribed by UNESCO in 1984. Lovely view. Not the Roman one.

The Byblos, Lebanon track

Wilson Energy XL Tennis Racquet

Written for this world alone.

Most of my consultations end the same way: the animal is fine, the owner is exhausted, and the problem is that something has been asked to work harder than it was built to. Shoulders are the same. I see a great many of them, metaphorically, in this shop.

The Wilson Energy XL is the answer for a shoulder that has had enough. A 112 square inch head — genuinely oversize — with an extended 27.5 inch length and a very light build, arriving pre-strung and ready to play.

Every one of those numbers is doing the same job: the huge head means a huge sweet spot and forgiveness on contact you did not quite find; the extra half-inch of length gives reach and leverage so the serve gets help; the light weight means the frame is easy to get round on time.

Put together, it produces depth from a swing that does not have to be big or fast, which is exactly what beginners, returning players and seniors need. It is unapologetically a power frame. If you already hit a heavy ball, this will send it long, and you want something at the 300-gram end instead.

Byblos is one of the oldest continuously inhabited places on earth, which is the sort of longevity I like to see. Byblos Castle was built by the Crusaders in the twelfth century from local limestone and salvaged Roman blocks, seat of the Genoese Embriaco family, Lords of Gibelet from 1100.

The Church of Saint John-Mark was begun in 1115, partly destroyed by an earthquake in 1170, and now serves the Maronite community. Deeper into the site, the Temple of the Obelisks was built between about 1600 and 1200 BC, its many small obelisks set up as offerings.

And the Roman theatre of around AD 218 survives only about a third intact, of a structure once some twenty metres high.

You will get use out of this frame everywhere from a seafront court in a light breeze to a covered hall in January, and by the way, it is also perfect for an afternoon spent doing nothing at all above that Roman theatre with the Mediterranean filling the whole background, because a frame this light is carried rather than lugged.

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