Ask any junior player in town where the tennis is in July and you’ll get a different answer depending on the day. Sarasota in summer is a patchwork of good options: shaded public courts in the morning, county programs at midday, and quiet neighborhood courts that open up once the afternoon storms roll through. I’m Michael Boothman, and after 30-plus years coaching here, I’ve learned that the families who make real progress over a summer aren’t the ones with the most expensive setup. They’re the ones who use the courts around them well.
This is a guide to playing tennis in Sarasota through the hottest month of the year — where to go, when to go, and how to turn ordinary summer court time into the kind of practice that actually moves the needle.
Play early, play in the shade
The single biggest scheduling decision in a Sarasota July is time of day. By 1:00 PM the heat index is punishing and the afternoon thunderstorms are loading up. The players who log the most quality hours are almost always on court before 10:00 AM.
At Potter Park, our 10 & Under group meets in the late afternoon during the school year, but in summer I tell families the same thing I tell myself: get the hard work done in the morning. Cooler temperatures mean cleaner footwork, longer rallies, and fewer of the sloppy, tired reps that teach bad habits. A 75-minute morning session in the shade is worth more than two hot hours at 2:00 PM where a kid is just surviving.
If mornings truly don’t work, the window right after an afternoon storm passes is the local secret. The courts drain fast in Florida, the temperature drops several degrees, and you’ll often have a public court entirely to yourself.
Where Sarasota juniors actually play
You don’t need a country club membership to develop a good junior player in this town. Some of my favorite training happens on public courts, and the variety is part of the point.
Potter Park is our home base for younger players — accessible, central, and well-kept. Around Siesta Key and the barrier islands, you’ll find courts that are busy with adults in season but wide open on a summer weekday morning, which makes them a great spot for a junior to get uninterrupted repetition. Out east toward Lakewood Ranch, newer public and community courts have opened up real options for families on that side of the county. And Stoneybrook is where we run our summer camp, so campers there get a structured version of everything I’m describing here.
The lesson underneath the list: the best court is the one your kid will actually get to consistently. Twenty minutes closer to home usually beats a fancier surface across the county, because proximity is what makes practice happen four times a week instead of one.
Don’t just hit — play points
Here’s where most summer court time gets wasted. A junior shows up with a parent or a friend, they stand across from each other, and they cooperatively rally back and forth for an hour. It feels like tennis. It looks like practice. But it barely resembles a match.
This is where the first of our Six Pillars comes in: Live Ball Is the Method. Real learning happens inside real rallies with real consequences — a point that ends, a score that matters, a decision under a little pressure. Fed balls from a basket and cooperative mini-rallies have their place for grooving a brand-new stroke, but they don’t teach a player to compete. The skills that transfer to a match are built by playing something that looks like a match.
So on your next summer outing, spend less time counting how many balls you can hit in a row and more time playing games. Play first-to-seven. Play a set where every point starts with a serve. Play “champion of the court” if you’ve got three or four kids. The number of balls a junior hits in cooperative rallying is a vanity stat. The number of points they compete for is what actually predicts improvement.
If you want a fuller picture of how we think about live-ball practice and small-group development, our community page walks through the way we run local sessions.
Keep score, and write the numbers down
Summer is long, and it’s easy to reach August feeling like nothing changed. The fix is simple: measure something. Pick one skill and track it.
A player working on serves can chart how many out of 20 first serves land in over a two-week stretch. A player working on consistency can count the longest rally they win in a points game each session. It doesn’t have to be fancy — a note in your phone is plenty. What matters is that by the end of July, your junior can look at a real number and see it moving. That’s not motivational fluff; it’s how confidence actually gets built, on evidence rather than on a parent saying “good job.”
The United States Tennis Association has solid free resources for families who want structure around junior play, from local tournament finders to development guidance. It’s a good complement to whatever your kid is doing on the court day to day.
Hydration and heat sense
I won’t belabor this because Sarasota parents know the drill, but it matters too much to skip. In July, water starts the night before, not at the court. Bring more than you think you need. Take real breaks in the shade every 20 to 30 minutes for younger players. And teach kids to read their own bodies — a headache or a wave of dizziness is a stop sign, not something to push through. A great summer of tennis is one where nobody gets hurt and everybody wants to come back tomorrow.
Make the season count
A Sarasota summer is a gift for a developing player. There’s no school pulling focus, the days are long, and the courts are here for anyone willing to show up. The families who make the most of it keep it simple: play in the morning or after the storm, use the courts close to home, play real points instead of cooperative rallies, and write down one number that proves the work is paying off.
If you want help building a summer plan for your junior — or you’re curious about our small-group sessions and camp — you can learn more on the about page or reach me directly at 941-239-4703 or michael@srq.tennis. The heat is temporary. The habits your kid builds this month will still be there in the fall.
See you on the court.