Tennis for Friday

Looks like its going to be rather wet Friday afternoon, possibly early friday afternoon.

I'd like to get some playing in before it does start raining, so lets get out early tomorrow.

Thinking alittle BBQ Monday and alot of tennis.

Good match on primetime, Raddick.

The wood racquet tourney

You know if we decide to have a wood racquet tourney we should at least reserve the courts. I would imagine it would be a short tourney so we could reserve the courts for a weekend. I think we should divide the tourney based on NTRP ratings. Should it be doubles only or both singles and doubles?

Let's hear some opinions on what should happen.

Opening day Aug 15!

With little fan fare the Lower Woodland courts resumed operations.
A phone call from Sprague around noon let me know we were playing.
So I arrived to find Tim and Berry breaking in the courts, soon afterwards Vic showed up and Berry and I of course showed the Tim and Vic that it didin't matter what courts we played on, we still beat them.

First Ace.. Tim
First Shank.. Tim
First on the parking lot.. Tim

Tim there playing with the anti Weed eater.

Seattle tennis mecca!
Tremendous, no cracks, no dead spots, no un-even surfaces, no cars, no butts and no distractions.
I did a search on court construction and this seems to be the closest to what we have.. called decoturf.

It favors for right now, top spin and slices. If you have a hard fast serves and strokes.. watch out cause now they just sit up, I found that out today. That being said, its fun.. top spin check and bounce higher, and slices slide. Footing is sure, you can stop on a dime. With every bounce, ruminants of fuzz and ball stuff are stuck to the court like bad chinese food left to dry on a plate.

For those interested.. heres regulation Court demensions


8/16 Bring your own food and bev.. Kevin providing the BBQ facilities. So chips, dogs and libation and plenty of tennis!

One day, and it will be a hot one

Well wev'e all endured the past 3 months, mostly at the upper courts and now it has come to one final day. I think we can all say that despite the handicap we all had a good time up there and there was certainly some good tennis, despite some of the craters and faults that made up the Upper courts. Some of the last minute finishing details of the courts..
and

What Lou Wick received for being in the finals of the National 80's tournament not to long ago in Portland.

From Bill Peters

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/othersports/2008106538_dodgeball12.html

Dodgeball article.. Bill Replied with a nice letter that he can share with all if he chooses.

Now..

Front page stuff on the Seattle Times..

A few kind words, "joy and terror", etc

I queried Ken Holden about security and whatnot....his response...

Dear Mr. Horn,

Thank you for your kind words. I am extremely proud of how well this project has run and the superb results we are getting. The last minute details are always a crunch, and I'm hoping they can all be completed by end of the work day on the 15th. Minor but important details like getting new vending machines, getting all the bleachers moved back, finishing the striping of the new parking lot, and getting all the court rules and the DOs and DON'Ts signs reinstalled are consuming my time at present.

I can appreciate your concern for the security of this wonderful new facility. You ask about security cameras, however from other projects I've worked on where we had the same concerns, since there was not an issue with personal safety cameras were not to be considered. As for locking the courts, they will be open and actively in use until the lights go out at 10:30 or 11:00. We just do not have staff available at that time to go around and lock all the gates to the courts. We do have a security service that locks the park restrooms throughout the summer, and we can certainly request that they do a surveillance drive by when the park closes. Other than this, I would have to say the best approach to reducing vandalism and abuse of the facility is to have it actively used. I'm confident that this will be the case. However, we have already had some graffiti on the new wall. The Contractor is taking care of it at this point. Even with this issue I'm hoping active and continuous use will be a determent.

Again, thank you for your email and kind words.

Ted Holden, Senior Landscape Architect, Project Manager
Seattle Parks and Recreation

"Creating community through people, parks and programs." www.seattle.gov/parks


>>> William Horn 8/9/2008 2:53 PM >>>
Dear Mr. Holden,
Just a note of thanks on behalf of Seattle tennis enthusiasts
(addicts, obsessives, etc.) for your part in the transmogrification of
the Lower Woodland courts into the splendiferous incarnation nearing
completion. I would have to call them spellbinding if that didn't
sound so over the top. Gratitude and superlatives are ricocheting among
those of us who have had a look.
Now since, like Baudelaire, I am a worrier ("I have cultivated my
hysteria with joy and terror."), I am wondering if any security
provisions have been made to protect this pristine and lovely work. Has
any thought been given to securing the courts overnight by padlock now
that they are fully enclosed? Are nighttime security cameras wildly
implausible? Signage regarding food, drink, and black-soled shoes? Am I
fretting entirely too much? If funding is not available for such
measures, can the city accept private donations to realize them? Just
wondering.
I understand the courts will be playable on 15 August. Thanks again
for your efforts in realizing this great asset to our city.

Yours,
William Horn

Concerning the new courts..

Was just thinking that it would be nice and fun.. Keyword 'FUN' maybe if next saturday we had a barbecue of sorts to kick off the opening of lower woodland courts. I thought Saturday since.. well it is a weekend and everyone will be available and I'm sure excited about being there. Maybe do a pot luck thing from about noon to 3 or somthing.

Just a thought.

comment your ideas if you have anything to kick off this fine event!

New Court pics

Interesting, the parking lot is level with the courts.. hope they put bumpers in.

Looks like bench's are being put in place.. looks good.

Court reservations

How much is it to reserve 1 court? The reason I bring this up, it's because next year we all know what's going to happen at the beginning of summer. I'd be willing to pitch in some money to reserve some courts on the same day our counter parts reserve the courts.

EVERY Tuesday and Thursday from 6:30 to 8:00 they reserve 4 courts from June to September. I'd at least like to know there are some guaranteed courts to play on after 6:30 without worrying about getting kicked off in the middle of some games. There are lots of us regulars to gather a few hundreds of dollars to reserve the courts. I know a lot of the other regulars bitch and moan about it too. I have a saying about people who bitch and moan, 1-Do something about it or 2-Shut up and accept it.

Any thoughts?

This just in.. Extra!

From Bill Peters, via Ted Holden of the Seattle Parks and rec..

Courts playable 8/15..

Let the count down .. start 9 days, Friday.

Thanks Bill.

Frequent guest

For the past several weeks we have been hearing and seeing this hawk around the upper courts. There is actually two of them and often will see them flying together in search of prey. I sent this photo to a raptor center and was told by Louise A. Shimmel, the executive director of the Cascades Raptor center in Eugene that it was a immature Coopers Hawk... here's her reply..

That's an immature Coopers hawk. They are nesting more and more in cities and suburbs, and being quite successful because of all the bird feeders (their primary prey is songbirds and pigeons). How neat to see them around! Most often they are a brown blur as they speed past the feeder, causing all the feeder birds to dive into cover! Louise

She is right, we can see these birds darh, dart and swoop, in and out through the canopy.

WA State Open Semis

Well, could you believe it...Steve was the chair umpire for the Hadad vs. Shields match. I was only there for the first set but, after speaking with Bill looks like the match came down to a 3rd set tie breaker. I wish I was there. I also heard there was a controversial over rule call. "Point penalty for interrupting a good match."

Faces of the wash open, pristine courts

8.2 updates..

All but the post and nets huh?

WA State Open

Checked out the tourney at the Seattle Tennis Club. Watched some really good singles. The last match I saw was Amir Hadad (The Israeli Tank) vs Patrik Fischer from UW. Really nice match. Hadad won the first set 6-4. Hadad was serving for set at 5-2 but got broken. Fischer held serve to get the match at 4-5 and that's when Hadad held serve to win the set. Next set Hadad seemed to be bothered by the wind and lost some focus. Fischer seemed to have picked up his game and I think he was up 2-0 in the set before I left to go back to work.

These guys were playing on the main court and they had the radar gun set up. Hadad's first serve speed average was around 116mhp, second serve average was around 88mhp. I saw Dean and Geoff Garza sitting in the seats behind the radar gun.

Patrik Fischer is a very solid and smart player. If anyone has watched him play you'll notice he serves left handed and hits ground strokes right handed. I heard he's ambidextrous and can play right or left handed, that's pretty awesome if you ask me. Hope to see more Greenlake regs out there watching.

Some guys to really watch are the Shields brothers from Colorado, they play tennis at Boise State and these guys are super solid. They remind me of Dimitry Tursinov. I watch Luke Shields (#3 Seed in the draw) play David Chu (Another solid UW player) and he beat Chu 3-6,0-6. In the second set it looked like Luke Shields was playing around with David. That's saying a lot since David Chu is a very good player himself. I was sitting by Dean but, he didn't seem impressed.