Archive for September 27, 2010

tennis basics

According to Wikipedia:

Tennis is a sport that people usually play individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a racquet that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over or around a net and into the opponent’s court. The object of the game is to play the ball in such a way that the opponent is not able to play a good return.

A tennis court measures

http://www.bctennis.com/articles/TennisRules.aspx

http://www.bctennis.com/articles/TennisRules.aspx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_court

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_court

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usta basics

USTA divides the country (Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, American Samoa and Guam) into 17 regional sections. Each section “maintains its own staff to administer USTA programs, establishes its own tournament schedule and issues its own rankings.” They are employees of the USTA.

usta Section-Map

  1. USTA Caribbean
  2. USTA Eastern
  3. USTA Florida
  4. USTA Hawaii Pacific
  5. USTA Intermountain
  6. USTA Mid-Atlantic
  7. USTA Middle States
  8. USTA Midwest
  9. USTA Missouri Valley
  10. USTA New England
  11. USTA Northern
  12. USTA Northern California
  13. USTA Pacific Northwest
  14. USTA Southern
  15. USTA Southern California
  16. USTA Southwest
  17. USTA Texas

usta eastern img_27_997_6450USTA Eastern has six regions:

  1. Long Island
  2. Metro: New York City five boroughs
  3. New Jersey
  4. Northern: Albany
  5. Southern New York: Westchester
  6. Western: Buffalo

Each region appoints a Local League Coordinator who has a steady day job but plenty free time in front of a computer screen to manage the region from A to Z, as the side gag. They have their own rules, in addition to the USTA’s. Under them, are the flight coordinator to run each event: Manhattan mixed doubles 7.0. They are all compensated. The mass emails show many work in real estate, IT, government and event planning – a profession that provides abundant screen time.

USTA organizational structure:

  • USTA
  • Lauren Bull, Adult League Manager, www.eastern.usta.com
  • Deborah-Rose Andrews, Local League Coordinator – Metro (Cathy Miller of Long Island)
  • Sheila Astudillo <astudillo@columbia.edu>

The timeline of a Metro season

Met Manhattan mixed 2013:

  • Sept 22, 2012: Call for Captain
  • Oct 1, 2012: to email the coordinator that you want to captain a team
  • Oct 4, 2012: preliminary roster due
  • Oct 25, 2012: the captain’s meeting
  • .. match schedule and rules sent to the captains ..
  • Nov 5, 2012 – Feb 6, 2013: the regular season
  • Dec 15, 2012: Registration deadline (sign up for a team)
  • Feb 25 – Mar 3: the Flight playoff
  • May 5: the Regional playoff
  • May 31 – June 2: the Sectional playoff
  • ..: the National

Metro Summer 2013:

  • Apr 30: Call for Captain
  • May 7: email the coordinator that you want to captain a team
  • May 7: preliminary roster
  • May 21: Captain’s meeting
  • Apr 10 – Jul 14: the regular season
  • July 1: Registration deadline (sign up for a team)
  • July 23: the Local playoff (Manhattan; Queens, etc.)
  • Aug 2: the (Metro) Regional
  • Aug 9: the Sectional
  • Oct 25: the National

LI mixed doubles 2013

  • 9/30/2012: email from LLC
  • 10/12: deadline to register a team
  • 12/14: must have three men/women registered on the team
  • 10/19: schedule: suggests the weekend; 2 captains work out the details
  • 11/11 – 4/26 the season
  • 1/1/2013: registration deadline
  • 5/5: playoff

 

The rating
To level the playing field the USTA developed a rating system, NTRP (National Tennis Rating Program). The definition of each level determines where one could play. The lowest level is 1.5 who is just starting out with the ability to get the ball into play to 7.0 like Serena and Roger. The 7.0 I’m writing about is the combined rating of two players. It could be 3.0/4.0 or 3.5/3.5.

The Metro region rules:

 

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Day 10 at US Open 2010

New York World Fair 1964 score board as of Sept 8th, day 10

I’m weak: 10:40pm flight out to Asia and I haven’t packed yet, but when the US Open is calling, I dash off to Flushing in no time. It’s day 10 of the two weeks long tournament. A glorious sunny day, cerulean blue sky n all that.

DSCN0616 DSCN0617

Jordan and I watched women’s doubles quarterfinals between Y. Chan and Jie Zheng vs Bethanie Lynn Mattek-Sands and Meghann Shaughnessy. The Chinese pair won over the Americans.

Zheng Jie's coach DSCN0620

Zheng Jie’s coach (can’t recall his name but he looks very familiar) in white cap came over to rally us to cheer for Zheng Jie.
“I’ll count to 3 .. you’ll say 郑洁加油” .. make an extra effort.
True to his words, he would shout in good Mandarin
“一,二, 三, ..”
We would chime in with “郑洁加油 ..” The echo worked: they won, despite 64-mile serve.

64 miles per hour serve Day 10, most courts are empty

Zheng had double fault and her second serve came at 64 .. but the China dolls managed to win with persistence and remarkable retrievals. By 10th day, most matches were done, courts became vacant

.

The qualifying rounds
US Open Day 3

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