Tennis
The Beautiful Game: Lake Worth’s Beautyman, spokesman for longevity, enters Tennis Hall of Fame
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Special to The Post
The pages listing Michael Beautyman’s on-court tennis accomplishments are plentiful, with dozens of USTA age-group titles all over Florida, all over the country, all over the world.
From South America to Canada, to the Netherlands and Spain, Beautyman has traveled countless miles and won and won and won on the tennis court.
A full-time Palm Beach County resident since 2013, currently living in Lake Worth Beach, Beautyman, 77, has been ranked No. 1 in the world and nation in multiple older age groups. He has been No. 1 in the world in the 75-and-over division in 2021, 2022 and 2023.
But Beautyman’s most cherished tennis accomplishment, one that partly boosted him into the New England Tennis Hall of Fame, is conveying this message.
Play tennis. Live long.
And Beautyman didn’t just talk the talk. He put his money up — $400,000 — to establish and run the largest tennis event ever — the 2004 ITF World Super Senior championships involving 1,350 players, 17 hotels and 35 tennis courts.
In the process, Beautyman championed and financed the first-ever 90-plus division for men in 2004, won by Gardner Malloy, and the first-ever 85-and-over championships for women, won by 1938 Australian Open champion Dodo Cheney.
“The ITF said they stopped at (age) 80 for women and 85 for men,” Beautyman recalled in a phone interview with The Palm Beach Post. “I said, ‘Not this year you don’t.'”
“They didn’t want me to do it. But there were some really good players. Malloy and Cheney were in phenomenal shape in 2004 and I thought they were good role models for everyone who’s interested in longevity. And who’s not?
“How do you stay healthy and able to run on the tennis court at 90? Malloy and Cheney showed the way.”
Last weekend in ceremonies, Beautyman was inducted into the New England Tennis Hall of Fame — which is perfectly located in Newport, Rhode Island, in the same building as the storied International Hall of Fame.
Beautyman’s tennis mantra is more vital than ever with the frenzied state of pickleball that is stealing older tennis players. And maybe stealing away years.
The USTA keeps pumping out press releases containing the newest scientific studies on how tennis is regarded as the world’s healthiest sport physically and mentally, beating out swimming.
“Pickleball is a fun, social game,” said Beautyman, a native of Great Britain. “But it’s a different kind of game. It doesn’t require the fitness or athleticism of tennis. Nothing wrong with it. But I don’t think you can use pickleball and still be running around at 90. But I think you can use tennis and be running around at 90. It’s a fit tool for longevity.”
Beautyman said he’s read that tennis topped swimming based on one edge. “One of the factors with swimming is it’s lonely,” Beautyman said. “Social is critical. You get that in pickleball but not the ability to run around.”
Beautyman, who had a vibrant law firm, still is traveling the globe for tennis events.
A former No. 1 player at Trinity College, Beautyman has played events in the past year in Croatia, Bolivia, Canada, Mexico, Peru, Turkey and a dozen states in the U.S.
He cops prize money, but the $1,000 first-place finish for some events doesn’t cover all his expenses. Beautyman does it for the love of the game, playing through occasional elbow pain after rehabbing from Tommy John surgery years ago.
At age 5, Beautyman moved to the U.S. from Britain, first to Philadelphia and then to the Berkshires in Pittsfield, Massachusetts.
In 2013, he preferred 365 days of outdoor tennis, so Beautyman arrived at the sport’s hotbed of Palm Beach County. He tried Boca Raton in 2013, and then West Palm Beach in 2014 before building a house in Lake Worth Beach in the College Park section.
Beautyman plays three to four times a week and has found 70-and-over world-class competition in formerly ranked players in Geoff Moore (Boynton Beach), Joe Bouquin and Jamie Pressley (Palm Beach).
His rotating venues include Seaview, the Breakers Hotel, Boynton Beach Tennis Center and Wellington Tennis Center. Beautyman will practice only serves at South Olive Park on the Lake Worth/West Palm border because it is hard court. He tries to stick to the softer clay. “The hard court is too tough,” Beautyman said.
“It’s wonderful to have a constellation of players who are the same age,” Beautyman said. “I can always go younger but the problem with younger guys is they hit the ball a lot harder but don’t necessarily get it into the court. So I don’t get the cardiovascular workout you get with someone my age. I want long rallies.”
Beautyman’s tennis resume is so comprehensive he can claim to have played at the high school championships on grass at the Queen’s Club — an important Wimbledon tune-up. He also played a schoolboy tournament at the All England Club, which hosts Wimbledon, but remembers it being played on the legendary facility’s less-renowned red clay courts.
Beautyman had attended prep school in the U.S. at Philips Exeter Academy, but his British parents made him take a postgraduate year in a school in England to get his “A-levels” (British high school diploma).
But Beautyman never went back to the mother country for good and made his mark on U.S. tennis. Even as a full-time attorney, Beautyman played qualifiers at the annual ATP event at the Longwood Cricket Club in the 1970s and early 1980s — the event then named the U.S. Pro Championships.
“I could assure you on those courts, I was the only qualifier that wasn’t a full-time player,” Beautyman said.
Nominating him for the Hall of Fame was John Mayotte, the brother of former tour great Tim Mayotte. John gave a speech last weekend on Beautyman’s behalf.
“John was the most talented of the six Mayotte children but Tim worked harder at it than John and John didn’t go as far,” Beautyman said.
Beautyman was most struck by the dignified setting at the Hall of Fame inductions, where grass courts still abound. He had to laugh when on Facebook, a friend “congratulated me on being indicted. I said that’s not quite the word.”
“It’s wonderful to see that history and evolution of the game,” Beautyman said. “The grass courts are fun to play on and fun to look at. They look a lot prettier than your average hard court or clay court. The event was inspiring.”
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