The brand new Centennial Sports Club made its debut to the public on November 2nd with the start of the ATP Challenger tennis tournament and once again we have Hua Hin’s biggest booster’s, the Liptapanlop family, to thank for it.
At a press conference held on the Friday before, Khun Suwat Liptapanlop promoted the upcoming tennis tournament and gave the press a tour of his new state of the art sports facility.
The almost completed Centennial Sports Complex sits on over 40 rai of land and consists of 11 tennis courts, with one being a sunken tournament court seating 1,000. There are two full size football pitch’s, a gymnasium, a fitness center on the 3rd and 4th floors outfitted with top of the line cardio and weight equipment, lockers, steam rooms, a VIP players lounge, a media center, a top-notch restaurant, a sports bar and a 26-meter rooftop swimming pool where food and drinks are served. As of press date, memberships will go on sale in December.
The Liptapanlop family, headed by Charaspim Liptapanlop, Chairperson of Proud Real Estate Co.Ltd., also own and manage the Hua Hin InterContinental Resort & Spa. Since opening the InterContinental in 2010 with a party that featured Canadian singing icon Paul Anka as the headliner,
The InterContinental went on to host the Hua Hin International Film Festival which drew many international celebrities including American film actor Ryan Gosling.
For the last eight years, Khun Suwat has been President of the Lawn Tennis Association of Thailand, so it’s no wonder that the InterContinental Resort has been the main sponsor for the Hua Hin World Tennis Invitational. This yearly tournament or exhibition match takes place in late December 
bringing top world ranked players to Hua Hin like Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova, Victoria Azarenka, Li Na, Kim Clijsters, Caroline Wozniaki along with many others. The men have also come to town such as Novak Djokovic, Tomas Berdych and Rafael Nadal.
The InterContinental is also the host for the yearly Asian Beach Polo Championship, the only Professional Polo event played on a beach. They were also a big sponsor of last years King’s Cup Golf tournament at Black Mountain which offered a record prize purse of one million U.S. dollars attracting both Asian and European PGA players and they were instrumental in bringing Thai Fight Night to Hua Hin. In fact, at almost every big event in Hua Hin you will find the InterContinental involved in some way.
In December 2014 the Liptapanlop family’s Proud Real Estate company opened their one billion baht Vana Nava water park in Hua Hin. Asia’s first Water Jungle, Vana Nava quickly became one of the town’s top attractions and has been wildly successful.
Next year, Proud Real Estate along with Bangkok’s Mall Group are set to open the 4 billion baht BluPort Hua Hin Resort Mall. Currently under construction, Blue Port boasts an impressive 140,000 square meters of space, with 25,000 sqm allocated equally to international retail shops, a department store, gourmet market, and a world class cinema complex.
The BluPort Mall will be attached to the new wing of the InterContinental Resort which is opening next month. The InterCon’s new wing will have a ballroom allowing for elegant weddings as well as large parties and business gatherings.
In a 2014 Interview with HOT Magazine, Khun Suwat 
articulated “currently when people think of places to visit in Thailand they think of Chiang Mai, Bangkok, Pattaya, Phuket & Koh Samui. Each of these destinations have distinctly different characteristics.
If we want Hua Hin to be included in the above list, then we must improve and develop it so it becomes distinctive as well. After all, Hua Hin has beautiful beaches, unique architecture, 10 golf courses and hosts many popular events, both local and international”.
The Liptapanlop family’s Proud Real Estate Company is certainly doing there best to shape Hua Hin with exciting and different characteristics and they continue to do so.
In a 2013 interview HOT Magazine conducted with Khun Suwat’s daughter, Khun Proudputh Liptapanlop, Managing Director of Proud Real Estate, she discussed amongst other things their future planned hotel and condominium project that will be part of Vana Nava. “The hotel and the residences are phase ll and lll of the entire development. Like our other developments, we will aim to excede all expectations and create something intrinsically different to what is already in the market place”.
With the opening of the InterContinental Hua Hin Resort and all of the big events they sponsor and support, the billion baht Vana Nava Water Jungle, the new state of the art Centennial Sports Complex and the upcoming BluPort Resort shopping mall, Hua Hin just gets better and better as a place to live and a destination to holiday and we have Hua Hin’s biggest boosters, the Liptapanlop family to thank for it.