April 25 Tennis Cancelled

Tennis has been cancelled tonight due to court conditions. We will resume tomorrow with match play.

TENNIS CANCELLED!

QuickStart Tennis is cancelled for Tuesday, April 19 due to weather. We will plan on practice for Monday, April 25.

QuickStart Rules and Scoring

This Tuesday (weather permitting) will be the first night for matches for the 7-8 and 9-10 year old teams. QuickStart rules are modified from regulation tennis. It would be ideal if each court had a parent volunteer or coach watching to make sure the players are following the rules and keeping the correct score. As the season goes on, everyone will be more familiar with match play, but the first night may be a little confusing. Posted below are the rules for QuickStart match play.

7-8 year old teams:

Court size is 36' x 18'. The doubles lines of the court are used as the baseline, and the singles lines of the court are used as the service line. The regulation service line and baseline serve as sidelines. An additional court can be used using the service line and net as sidelines.

Net size is 2'9" (the size of the mini nets used in practice)

Scoring is best of 3 games - first to 7 points in each game. The server gets two serves and each player serves two points at a time.

Serves can be overhand, underhand, done as a bounce and hit, or executed by the coach bouncing the ball and the player hitting it.

9-10 year old teams:

Court size is 60' x 21' for singles and 60' x 27' for doubles.

The regular net is used.

Scoring is best of 3 sets - first to 4 games earns a set. First to 7 points earns a game. If each player earns a set, then the first to 7 points earns the 3rd set.

The serve rules are the same as in regulation tennis.

QuickStart 2011 Kickoff Night

The weather cleared off for us and we had great weather for our first night of tennis. The focus for the night was ball and racquet control, and the kids did a great job. Tomorrow you can take your child to his/her court at 6:00. The 5-6 year olds will have Coach Andrew again; all other courts will have different instructors on Mondays and Tuesdays.

QuickStart for Monday, April 11

Tomorrow we will kick off the spring season of QuickStart tennis. I want to give you a little background about QuickStart tennis. Most if not all other sports utilize modified rules and equipment to teach proper skills to youth (think t-ball, basketball with 8 foot goals, shortened soccer fields, etc.) Tennis has been a little behind in this trend. The United States Tennis Association is now endorsing QuickStart tennis as the way to teach children tennis skills. Taking a small child on a regular sized tennis court with adult-sized racquets and regular tennis balls is a recipe for frustration at not being successful and lots of ball chasing. QuickStart Tennis utilizes smaller racquets and modified balls, nets, and court size to give children a chance to be successful at tennis. At first glance it will appear that children participating in QuickStart are not playing "real" tennis. However, they will be learning the skills necessary to progress them to a point where they will be able to be successful on a regulation sized tennis court with regulation balls. Many youth tournaments now are going by the QuickStart format, and the USTA is pushing for cities and schools to put permanent QuickStart lines on their tennis courts for childrens' use. Please let me know if you have any questions about QuickStart tennis. Our hope is that all children involved this spring will gain a love for tennis as they become successful at learning tennis skills.

Welcome to QuickStart Tennis

First practice is on Monday, April 11 at 6:00 at the Indiana Wesleyan University tennis courts. If this is your child's first year with QuickStart tennis, he/she will be receiving a tennis racquet as part of the welcome package. Children who have participated in QuickStart tennis before will be receiving a tennis bag and should bring their own racquet to the practice.