MVTC Court Report-December 2016

Assembled by Jill Nagahara

President’s message

Dear MVTC members,

It has been my great pleasure and privilege to lead this great club as your President for the last three years. It has been a wonderful three years, during which we achieved much together. With the support of all of you and a great set of volunteer Board members, we have transformed the Club into a vibrant entity with about 250 members. We are now incorporated in the State of California and registered with the IRS and the State of California as a 501(c) 7 nonprofit corporation and a USTA Community Tennis Association. This enables MVTC to avail of the benefits of CTA insurance rates. We also renewed our contract with the City of Mountain View.

We had a fantastic 50th anniversary celebration with a grand party and tournaments put together by the great 50th anniversary committee. We had 9 tournaments in 2016 with great food and tennis, including two Interclub events and the 50th anniversary tournaments. We had 15 USTA teams in 2016, with many of them going to playoffs and 6 teams already registered for 2017. We had a write up in Tennis Magazine about the Club and its 50th anniversary. We had two General Meetings for the year with Bill Simons from Inside Tennis as the speaker for the Spring General meeting and the 50th anniversary celebrations associated with the Fall meeting. You can look at the year in retrospect with the photos here.

With such a great year behind us, it’s time for me to step down as President, and hand the reins of MVTC to Terrie Rayl, who has served so ably as Vice President and Treasurer in 2015.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank several people who helped me in this tremendous effort over the last three years: Jo-Ann Smith, Ray Uribes, Dave Perotti, Michael and Catherine Puzon, Tony Serksnis, Debbie Ryan, Katharine Altemus, Carol Tolen, John Farcich, Liz Chambers, Noah Banks, Bill Martin, George Koo, the Mountain View TAB, the current Board – Guillaume Cottarel, Jeremy Chen, Jill Nagahara-Evans, Jim Evans, Terrie Rayl, Myrna Irigon, Sameer Ladiwala, Perry Lim, Kathy Nichols, John Togasaki, Bill Martin, and all the captains and many others who have volunteered to run the USTA teams, the tournaments and other club activities.

Jeremy Chen is also stepping down as Tournament Chair, after many years of service in this role. He is one of the most dedicated volunteers I have known, and has done a phenomenal job with the MVTC tournaments. Another person who will be sorely missed is Social Chair, Myrna Irigon. Myrna led our 50th anniversary celebration committee.

I must also thank City representatives, Council Member and former Mayor John McAlister, John Marchant, Lauren Merriman, Shaun Chilkotowsky, Colin James, the Swetka family, and Mountain View Tennis for their continuing support of MVTC.

Welcome to the new Board members for 2017 – Shashank Gopal, Peter Dollinger, Natalie Johnson, and Harold Habeck. Thank you for volunteering to make MVTC the best Tennis Club in the Bay Area.

This is a wonderful club because of great volunteers. If you are interested in volunteering, please let Terrie and the MVTC Board for 2017 know. The Club can use all your talents to grow.

It’s not often a volunteer-run City sponsored club gets to celebrate 50 years. Thanks to all your support we just did that. I wish Terrie and the new Board for 2017 all the very best in leading MVTC to even greater heights. Wishing all of you and your families the very best of the holidays and a wonderful 2017!

Best Regards,
Madan Venugopal,
President, Mountain View Tennis Club, 2014-2016

MVTC Grand Prix Invitational Summary:

By Perry Lim

We had our last tournament of the year with our Grand Prix Invitational Tournament on Saturday Nov 12. The Invitational Tournament is meant to reward players who have actively participated in MVTC tournaments throughout the year. 40 points were the requirement for entry, typically a semifinal showing or team tennis win. The format was World Team Tennis sets with 1st to 5 games. We introduced a free point handicap for teams with 0.5 rating difference which could be used at any time during the match, making for some fun and interesting tennis.

We had 14 players total with 5 rounds and 2 players sitting out each round. The Men's 1st place winner was Dana Glusovich with 20 points, 2nd place with 18 points Jean-Luc Marce, and a 3-way tie for 3rd place with 17 points each: Stephen Lai, Jim Evans, and Perry Lim. The 1st place winner received a nice MVTC T-shirt celebrating our 50th year. Other prizes awarded were another T-shirt, cooler bag, MVTC towel, and a bottle of wine.

The Women's 1st place winner with a score of 18 points was Marla Lindsay, 2nd place Mary Watanabe with 17 points, Kathy Nichols 3rd place with 16 points. The women received a nice bag with various goodies including tennis balls. For being the only person to enter every tournament this year, Jill Nagahara received a special gift of a can ball of tennis balls with a special card: a free entry into any future tournament. Every entry also received a set of retractable headphones just for entering. Lunch with pizza, salad and dessert was served to end the fun day. See our MVTC album for photos.

The Grand Prix Winners for 2016: Kathy Nichols (335 points) and Perry Lim (325 points). Each winner will receive a check for $50.

That's all for this year. PLEASE RETURN AND JOIN US NEXT YEAR.

USTA News

The club will sponsor 6 USTA league teams for the 40+ adult and mixed seasons that start play in early January. A big thank you to Warren Yamaguchi, Todd Young, Jill Nagahara-Evans, John Farcich and Ellen Pui Gazen for taking on captain roles.

Please note as well that the the 65+ league team registration opens Jan 9. NorCal 65 & Over Doubles League is open to men and women ages 65 years and over. Match format consists of 3 doubles matches. NTRP levels 3.0, 3.5 and 4.0. Matches are played weekdays between 10:00 and 1:00. More information can be found at http://www.norcal.usta.com/adults/leagues/adult65/. Get in touch if you are interested in running a team.

Happy Playing

Jim Evans, USTA Chair
USTA@mvtc.net

HAPPY HOLIDAYS! FROM THE MVTC 2016 BOARD ...AND THE MVTC 2017 BOARD