Posts tagged usta tournament

“If You Don’t Like Us, Find A Way To Get Rid Of Us!”

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1 month ago
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“If you don’t like us, find a way to get rid of us!”  That was Patrick McEnroe’s response to a parent’s question regarding the 2014 Junior Competition Changes at last summer’s Girls 12 Nationals in Atlanta, and it was really the beginning of my extensive coverage of the new calendar that USTA was planning to implement beginning January 1, 2014.

Now that the calendar changes have been finalized and approved at the National Board level, I figured I should do a sort-of recap of the process around the changes and how they came to be . . .

  • Some time in 2011: Jon Vegosen, then president of USTA, charged his Junior Competition Committee (JCC) to devise a new national tournament schedule.  Please note that the JCC was chaired by Tim Russell, a More >

New Rules in GA for U10s & U12s

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1 month ago
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Why, you might ask, is there a French magazine cover pictured at the top of this post?  Well, 2 reasons . . . first of all, because I want everyone to notice that it features French pro, Richard Gasquet, at the age of 9, playing tennis using a yellow ball.  Second of all, because in just a few weeks I’ll be at Roland Garros watching a couple of days of phenomenal tennis at the French Open and am pretty darn excited!  (P.S. Anyone who wants to hook me up with courtside seats, you know how to reach me!)

Some of you may have gotten wind of the changes happening across the country with 10-and-under tennis and the mandated use of the ROG balls in tournament play.  What you may not know is that ROG is now infiltrating the 12s, too.

The state of More >

Now What?

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1 month ago
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The 2014 changes to the junior competition calendar are all but a done deal.  The Powers That Be at USTA, despite our best efforts, have decided they (not parents, not coaches, not the players themselves) know what’s best for our young players and have slashed competitive opportunities at the national level by a huge margin.  So, now what?

Add to the mix the fact that several USTA sections have also adopted a rather Draconian policy for the 10-and-unders and 12-and-unders, forcing them onto the ROG path, making it so they have to play all the way up in the 14s if they want to play with a yellow ball on a full-size court.  If you haven’t already, be sure to listen to the free podcast of my radio show with Lawrence Roddick (Andy’s older More >

Another Giant Step

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1 month ago
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This past weekend was another giant step in my Tennis Parent Journey.  My son drove himself to a tournament.  Out of town.  About 2 hours from home.  While my husband and I were at a family reunion out of state.

Now, before you start thinking I am totally out of my mind, please know that I enlisted the support of a Fellow Tennis Mom to be on call for my son.  She and her son were staying at the same hotel as my kid.  She was in charge of checking my son into his room and making sure he had his key.  Her son was playing in the same age division as my kid.  And the boys go to school together.  (And I now owe her a very nice bottle of wine!)

As my husband and I left our house and headed to the airport, I made a mental list . . . Had I More >

The Tournament that Almost Was

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1 month ago
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Finally, after months of being on alternate lists and finding out last minute whether or not he was going to play that weekend, my son got direct entry into one of our Southern Level 3 tournaments AND was seeded!  He had a pretty good draw and figured he had a very good chance of getting to the Semis if not winning the whole thing.  He had been playing well in practice over the past couple of weeks and went into the weekend feeling very confident in his game.

So, early Friday evening, we packed up the car and headed to South Carolina, an easy 2-hour drive from our house.  The weather forecast was bleak, but we kept hoping the Weather.com folks would be wrong (hey, that’s not a reach, right?!?) and that the 2-day tournament would finish More >

A National Schedule & Ranking System That Makes Sense

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3 months ago
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There have been several comments on this blog asking what parents, players, and coaches want to see in terms of a junior competition structure – USTA has asked all of us to email them at LetUsKnow@usta.com to share our thoughts.  Some people who are way smarter than I am have come up with one proposal that just may work.  This proposal addresses the travel and cost issue, the “earned advancement” issue, the missed school issue, and the rankings issue, among other things.  Please take some time to read through it and share your thoughts in the Comments below.

The key points to this proposal are as follows:

  1. No changes to the existing Level 1s.
  2. Every section (except Hawaii and Caribbean) hosts a Level 2 and at least one Level 3 during the More >

New National Seeding Rules

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3 months ago
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A couple of days ago, I saw a post on my Facebook newsfeed from USTA’s Junior Competition folks announcing seeding changes for National tournaments.  Apparently, I’m one of only a few people who saw the post or knew anything about it.  When I posted the link to the changes on the ParentingAces Facebook page, which also feeds to my Twitter, I got very little feedback from anyone . . . that is, until the seedings came out for this weekend’s Regional Segment tournaments!

Apparently, the biggest change to the seeding criteria has to do with using a separate Singles Seeding List – which does not include any doubles ranking points – to seed the singles draws.  For the doubles draws, there is now a separate National Individual Doubles Seeding More >

How ITF Junior Tournaments Work

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6 months ago
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Just when I thought I had the USTA tournament thing finally figured out, my kid decided he wanted to try playing some ITF events.  And, after reading the current ITF Junior Regulations and searching all over the Web for information and coming up pretty much empty-handed, I started asking questions of those with way more knowledge than I have so I could understand how the ITF process works.  Here’s what I’ve learned so far about ITF events held in the US:

  • You must be between the ages of 13-18 to play in an ITF Junior tournament. You may enter a tournament starting at age 12 years 11 months, however.  Unlike USTA which uses the player’s birth month to determine age and eligibility, the ITF uses the calendar year.  For the 2012 ITF season, More >

Quick Guide to the USTA Website

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1 year ago
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Even the Higher-Ups at USTA will admit that their website is difficult to navigate.  Well, really, that’s an understatement.  USTA has gone to great lengths to put some very helpful information on their site – the problem is that the average visitor can’t find it!  So, in the name of identify-problem-create-solution, below is a list of links to some of the information I’ve found to be useful in navigating the world of Junior Tennis.  You might want to print out this list and keep it handy then add to it as you discover more sub-pages.  If you have found any other useful articles at USTA.com, please add them in the Comments section below.

USTA Section Pages: www.usta.com

Click on the Find Your Section box in the top right corner of the More >

Forever Friends

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1 year ago
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My dad is the one 4th from the left. His opponent/friend from yesterday is on the far left.

This week, I’m visiting my parents in Shreveport, Louisiana, where I grew up.  Yesterday, I had the chance to go watch my 74-year-old dad play tennis against his long-time friend and rival in what has become a once- or twice-weekly ritual.  These two guys have been competitors since childhood.  They have also been friends since childhood.  They played against each other in the juniors and with each other in college.  Yes, the level of tennis has changed over the years.  Neither one moves too well these days.  Neither one has the piercing groundstrokes that once defined their games.  And neither one has lost the desire to win when facing the other More >

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