CTCNewsletter PassingShots February 2012

Amessage from CTC President:

Happy New Year!

Our Club had a very busy 2011. Members participated in a total of 81USTA teams (compared to 68

teams in 2010), 21 of those teams reached theplayoffs and 3 teams entered the District or Sectional

Championships. We also held 3 very successful Tennis Social events, as wellas 3 Women’s Interclubs

at the 3.0, 3.5 and 4.0 levels. All of this was accomplished as ourmembership reached a record high

of 472 members.

Several members of the 2011 Cupertino TennisClub (CTC) Board have retired. Onbehalf of CTC, I

would like to extend our appreciation to SusanHollis (Vice President), Grace Haig (USTA Coordinator), Eunice Yan (SocialChairperson) and Ellis Wilkens (Web Master) for volunteering their time and fortheir exemplary contributions.

With the coming of 2012, we have a new Board for theCupertino Tennis Club (CTC). TheCTC Board consists of a 6 - member Executive Council and 6 Chairpersons.

Executive Council:

President, Raymond Yan

Vice President, Pat Frischmann

Secretary, Emi Kawamoto

Treasurer, Jack Stanley

Membership, John Sperinde

USTA Coordinator, Jane Chan

Chairpersons:

Socials, Robert Kunzler

Interclubs, Emi Kawamoto

Newsletter, Dotti Rado

Web Master, Jeff Labadie

Web Site Technical, Mike Wilkens

Community Liaison, Ed Hirshfield

The contact information for all Board memberscan be found on the CTC website: www.cupertinotennisclub.org.

CTC is co-sponsored by the City ofCupertino. The objectives of theClub are:

topromote recreational and social tennis;

toencourage skill improvement and sportsmanship in tennis;

toestablish teams to represent CTC; and

toprovide opportunities for tennis competition in Cupertino.

The funding of the Club is generated solelyfrom the membership fees. Themajority of the Club expenses are used toward benefiting our members. The Club expenses in 2011 were asfollows:

67%USTA activities (balls, rule books and captain’s gifts)

16%Social Events (4 Social events and Interclub matches)

14%Charity and Community Support

3%Operation and Administrative

The Board meets once a month and the upcomingmeeting date is published in the CTC Website. We are in the process of working on the 2012 budget and theactivities plan. If you have comments or suggestions related to the Club,please don’t hesitate to contact any of the Board members.

Besides the usual Club activities, this yearthe Board is planning to complete the projects we started in 2011. They include adding shade umbrellas onthe courts used for USTA matches and adding an internet-accessible web cam toview the court conditions.

The biggest challenge for the Club this yearwill be court availability during the USTA Adult League season, which runs fromMarch 21 through July. As the Club membership grows, the demand for USTA teamsalso increases. However, the availability of courts at the Cupertino SportsCenter (for USTA matches) remains the same. To make matters worse, USTA has created a new schedule thisyear which puts the Super Senior 60 Leagues and the Adult League in the sameMarch through July timeframe.

In order to ensure all members who want to payin the leagues a fair opportunity to participate, we have to make some changesto accommodate the demands. Thisincludes a tighter control of the number of teams at each level as well asasking the captains to take on a larger roster. In some cases, this may mean that members may not be able to“play up” from their published level or must choose only one level toplay. I understand these changesmight not be well received by some of you but they are necessary to get usthrough the Adult season this year. I plead for your understanding and thank you for your support.

Raymond Yan

CTC President

2011 COMBO LEAGUE COMES TO AN END WITHGREAT RESULTS!

(All of the USTA informationin this newsletter is thanks to Jane Chan, USTA Coordinator)

The USTA Combo league was very popular at CTCas evidenced by the 13 teams that participated in the 2011 season. Thanks to all of the captains thatworked hard to create and fun and competitive environment!  Year-end playoff results are asfollows:

MEN’S COMBO

M7.5A - Kevin Ong, captain - 1st Round winagainst Courtside, 2nd round loss to Decathlon

M8.5A - Ravi Shankar, captain - 1st Round loss to Los Gatos

WOMEN’S COMBO

W6.5A - Debbie Argabright, captain - 1stround loss to Courtside

W7.5A - Anne Neeter, captain - 1st roundloss to Courtside

W8.5C - Lynne Stark, captain - 1st roundloss to Courtside

2012 USTA LEAGUES GET STARTED

The 2012 Senior League is well under waywith 6 Men’s and 11 Women’s teams for a total of 17 team this season.

The Super Senior 65 League has formed 3 teamsthis year. Beverly Trindade willcaptain the Women’s 3.5, Simon Brafman will captain the Men’s 3.5 and JimMiller will head up the Men’s 4.0 team. Play starts the week of February 2oth. If you have not been in contact with a captain but wouldlike to play (you must be 65 this year or older to qualify for the league),please emailb4ujoin. (I stolethat excellent phrase from Simon :=) Don’t know the email address? Go to CTC website www.cupertinotennisclub.org,select membership, select “Membership Contact List 2012, enter your passwordand voila` - email addresses will appear.

Overlapping the SuperSenior65 league will bethe 2012 Adult League, which begins on March 26, and the SuperSenior 60 Leaguebeginning April 9. Captains are now registering their teams on the USTA websiteand CTC member sign-up has begun. Again, please emailb4ujoin. If you are new toUSTA and need help navigating the sign-up process, please send an email to USTACoordinator@Cupertinotennisclub.orgfor help.

Club Socials March Into 2012

My goal for 2012 is to continue to provide anofficial Tennis Club Social for each of the four seasons. With this in mind, I am delighted topresent the Club’s 1st Social of the year on Saturday, March 10, from 6 p.m.- 9p.m. at the Sports Center.

I plan to continue the successful formatemployed by Eunice last year, which is to have 24 people playing in rounds of30 minutes each, giving each court the ability to play 8 doubles games withno-ad scoring. CTC will, asalways, provide food and drinks.

This Social has been announced on our website(www.cupertinotennisclub.org)and allows you to sign up now, provided there are spaces available. We compete with other users of thecourts, so we are fortunate to have 6 courts designated for this event.

If you have any comments or suggestions, or ifyou would like to help, please contact me. Hope to see you at the March Social!

Robert Kunzler, CTC Social Coordinator Email me at Social@cupertinotennisclub.org

CTC MEMBERSHIP NEWS

WARNING

Reading the information on the followingtwo pages will provide you with everything you need to know to play tennis as aCupertino Tennis Club member. Never again will you be able to say “But I didn’tknow.”

Currently, there are about 260 individualswith a 2012 CTC membership. Thismeans that about 200 still need to renew. Most of you will be playing in the upcoming USTA Adult season so now isa good time to renew your membership. CTC membership always expires at year end, so there isn’t anyadvantage to waiting. If you don'trenew soon, you will be dropped from the CTC mailing list and will need tovisit the CTC website to find out what is happening. Why risk the chance of missing email notices of deadlines todeclare your intent to play (* see page 4) on a USTA league, theannouncement of an upcoming CTC Social or the announcement that the latestnewsletter is available on the website?

Remember that to play in a USTA league or inthe Women’s Interclub, you must be a current member of the Cupertino TennisClub (CTC) and an annual pass holder of the Cupertino Sports Center (CSC). If you have friends or teammates whoare new to the Sports Center, please remind them of this dual requirement.  New members are often unaware of thisrequirement so please help them out. Senior members often forget so help them out too.

There are a few misconceptions andmisunderstandings about the membership process.

CSC and CTC are separate organizations.  You need both the “S” and the “T” to participate in anyorganized tennis provided by CTC: USTA, Socials and Interclub.  This is especially confusing to newmembers. I leave it to the readerto figure out which is which this time, in the hope that figuring out thepuzzle will burn the information into your memory. (Hint: go to www.cupertinotennisclub.org, select “New to CTC?’, then select “CTC versus CSC , what’s the difference?” )

The payment for CTC online membership isthrough PayPal. You do not need a PayPal account topay your CTC dues. You can use a credit or debit card oreven an echeck. PayPal willencourage you to open an account with them since that is their business but youcan just ignore that. If you havetrouble with this process email me directly at Membership@cupertinotennisclub.org.

Handing me a check or cash is not sufficient for membershipin CTC. We need your contact information andagreement to the liability waiver in addition to the money.

Don’t know your CSC pass holder IDnumber? It’s on your CSCmembership card.Please take care to enter it correctly during the CTC membership renewal or newmember process. If you entersomeone else’s number, you will remove them from the membership list. Not good. What password should you use? You decide. Some use their USTA password to make it easy to remember.

To renew/join CTC for 2012:

Goto the CTC website at www.cupertinotennisclub.org

Click on“Membership”

Clickon “2012 membership application:

Complete the application includingpayment. Your membership isimmediate with successful online payment.

To check that you are a 2012 CTC member:

Goto the CTC website at www.cupertinotennisclub.org

Clickon “Membership”

Clickon “Membership lists (names only) for: 2012”

If your name is in the list, you are a currentmember. If you think you should bea member but do not find your name in the above list, contact me at Membership@cupertinotennisclub.org.

An Important CTC Process -Declare Your Intent To Play

Submitted by Jane Chan, USTA Coordinator

Withso many leagues underway, I would like to re-emphasize the importance of the“Declare Your Intent to Play” process. Here is an article from the January 2011 newsletter, written by GraceHaig, our 2010 and 2011 USTA Coordinator, on the importance of the process aswell as step-by-step instructions to complete the task of “declaring yourintent to play.”

CTC asks all members planning to play in aUSTA league, as well as all members planning to captain a team, to declaretheir intent to play and/or captain before registering on any team, orregistering a team, on the USTA website. We do so in order to prevent the numbers of the teams from exceeding thecourt capacity at the Cupertino Sports Center. By looking at the intent to play” list, CTC will have a headcount and be able to determine how many teams we can possibly accommodate. Of course, members can change theirmind and decide not to play later on. If you change your mind at a later date and want to play or form a teambut did not register your intent, please remember that it may be hard tosqueeze you or your team in once we max out our allotted courts.”

Step-by-Step Instructions to DECLARE YOUR INTENT TO PLAY:

1. Go to the CTC website at www.cupertinotennisclub.org.

2. Click on the link “Declare Intent to play USTA League” and complete theform. Please note: If you wish to captain a team, please sign up as early aspossible so your players can find your name in the list of captains.

3. Captains - please do not register yourteam(s) with NorCal until you are notified by the USTA Coordinator. You will be contacted within a coupleof days of the closing date.

Great Tennis and Good Luck to Everyone! Jane Chan, USTA Coordinator