Belated Tidings
by Jack Lewis, Intermountain Board President

Welcome Centers
A new year has begun with promise of much excitement for all of us with Tennis as an important part of our life.
2004 will be the year of the Tennis Welcome Center – an idea developed jointly by the USTA, the USPTA and USPTR, the TIA (tennis businesses) and (quietly) the CIA. In a few months, you will see and hear advertising for these facilities and parks throughout Colorado, welcoming new and returning players to tennis.
Now, I know some of you will feel the name Tennis Welcome Center conjures up visions of those drab places that welcome you when you cross a state line on the interstate. The USTA has taken that into account and wants to capitalize on that association. Who doesn’t look forward on a road trip to the chance to take a leak and ask directions to the nearest McDonald’s. Accessible tennis facilities like the Point and Meadow Creek just off U.S. 6, west of Denver, will be great TWCs. I do like the friendliness and unpretentiousness of Meadow Creek, but it is not a good place to walk your dog.
The recent national surveys conducted by the USTA show that millions of people in the United States have tried tennis but given it up right away because of a bad first experience. These bad experiences may have involved mostly fetching balls at a parks court with a friend. I confess that I have occasionally had not particularly nice thoughts while walking after tennis balls I failed to hit back. But, I have had much more dangerous thoughts walking after golf balls I have hit 200 yards (consistent liar about distance) 45º to the left and 150 yards (that’s better) 45º to the right.
It is possible that lack of growth in tennis is because it is a difficult game to learn. Or that, Americans have trouble sticking with anything you can’t finish by simply clicking to another website.
Well, the Tennis Welcome Center will avoid that bad first experience with a fun introductory experience that has the new player on the 4.0 team in a jiffy, sipping after-match beers with his or her new friends and planning a trip in September to the U.S. Open.
I actually like the Tennis Welcome Center initiative and even can justify all the advertising dollars the USTA is allocating for it this summer. After all, it could take ad space from George W. and this all-star cast of 11 or so Democrats telling you that the other is a probable felon and that you need to call them and tell them you are on to them. We will all be very happy to hear about a new TWC rather than missing (and perhaps miraculously found) WMD.
Seriously, I do think we can all do a sedentary friend a favor this summer by directing them to a Tennis Welcome Center. It’s a good way to share this game we love – and you can’t watch TV while you play.