By Liza Horan

New York—If you follow the high school rodeo circuit, you probably know Heber City, Utah. That's where the national high school rodeo championship team hails from. If you're into fly fishing, you probably know that Tiger Woods' favorite spot is nearby. And if you're into snow sports, you might have spied the town lying five minutes south of Park City.

If you're interested in taking your tennis up a level—literally—you'll want to go 5,600 feet above sea level to the Cliff Drysdale Tennis Academy. The former Top 10 player, who is commentating ESPN2's Australian Open coverage through Feb. 1, is opening his first high-altitude training center in the West.

The academy, set to open in late 2010, will have six courts, both clay and hard surfaces, and offer indoor and outdoor play for year-round action.

The Cliff Drysdale Tennis Academy will be located in a private, world-class recreational development called Red Ledges, which includes Jack Nicklaus golf courses (an 18-hole long course and a 9-hole short course) and a Jim McLean golf instruction facility. An indoor/outdoor equestrian center, spa, and swimming and fitness facility round out the Red Ledges activities, while hiking, fishing and snow sports are nearby.

Drysdale, Nicklaus and McLean were the dream team that developers M. Anthony Burns and Nolan D. Archibald wished to bring in to the 2,000-acre residental community. The pitch was three for three.

Of course, such great odds are all in the approach.

For the tennis plan, Burns, the longtime CEO of Ryder System Inc., called his friend Butch Buchholz, who founded in 1985 what is now the Sony Ericsson Open in Key Biscayne, Fla. Even though Burns had known Drysdale for years, he sought a bit of direction from Buchholz, who once called on Burns for support of his fledgling tournament.

"We had known Cliff for years, but we asked Butch, How can we set this up?" Burns said Wednesday in an exclusive interview at the W Union Square. "Butch is a very good friend. He asked Ryder to help out when they wanted to put in tennis courts in Key Biscayne in what was going to remain wetlands." Ryder signed on as a sponsor—"when they had wooden bleachers," Burns said—and the wetlands became the hard courts of Crandon Park and now "the fifth Grand Slam" as the tournament is often called.

The development of Red Ledges, which is owned equally by Burns and Archibald, who runs Black & Decker, comes at an interesting time in the housing market.

"We want to be prudent so we're pacing it," project manager Todd Cates said of the schedule to open the Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course this spring, followed by a couple of tennis courts in the next year and then the completed Cliff Drysdale Tennis Academy in about 24 months. "We analyzed all the similar type of developments in Utah, Nevada and surrounding areas. Nobody really did tennis right. We'll survive because we've aligned ourselves with the right people."

The team was quick to point out that the involvement of its sports legends is not about lending a name or investing, which has been a trend in the last 20 years. [See SFGate.com article on Agassi Graf Development LLC.]

Home lots are being sold from $25,000 to $850,000. Residences run from just under $1 million for a villa to $1.5 million for a cottage. Tennis academy participants will have an option to book a villa at Red Ledges, or to stay at a nearby hotel.

Burns notes that Red Ledges isn't a story about new big, bad developers taking over a little town.

Rather, it's about returning home to better a community. Burns—who admits he was an active player 'til his wife started beating him on the court—grew up nearby. His wife of 40+ years is a native of Heber City, but she prefers tennis to the rodeo, playing on two league teams.

It's also about doing business with longtime friends-through-business. "We're going to see each other at the Fairchild Tropical gala," Burns said of Buchholz's, Drysdale's and his own plans to attend the botanic garden fundraiser on Feb. 7 in Miami.