 |
| Arriving |
 |
| Al Davison doing umpire announcements |
 |
| Tiurnament Director Guy Diebold |
 |
| Scorer Raj |
 |
| Hospitality by Cathy Diebold |
The BIG DAY finally arrived and the Thibodaux club was well prepared. Coffee, snacks, posted schedules, terrain layouts, scoreboards, circles, numerous playing umpires (Al Davison as Head Umpire), morning announcements, a field of twenty doubles teams, etc.
The only thing not under their control was the weather. Though the day started out reasonably well. and they had a giant, permanent covered pavilion within walking distance of the courts for hospitality and gathering, the weather got worse as the morning progressed.
Nevertheless, through gentle prodding to keep play on schedule, and by timing the games at 50 minutes (plus one end after time elapsed), we did manage to get the three scheduled qualifying rounds of play completed by lunch time.
I'm sorry that we don't have any snapshots of Saturday play, but with Shirley playing (partnered with Mike Owens from Louisiana), and myself assisting with the umpiring, and the rain making exposing ones phone/camera to the elements risky, it just became too difficult.
I do have the results of the rankings after the three qualifying rounds here:
The top eight finishers qualified for Group A Concours. Teams ranked ninth through sixteenth qualified for Group B Concours, and teams ranked seventeenth through twentieth qualified for Consolante.
As you can see if you recognize some of these names, players from many states made the trip to be involved with a new club's first tournament. At a glance, I see Florida, New York, Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina, Texas, and Nevada represented.
As you may already know, the event management/jury made the decision to cancel Saturday afternoon play and resume on Sunday. As many of the courts were practically unplayable due to standing water, it was really the only choice.
Guy had warned attending players that the weather forecast for Saturday, if accurate, might require play on Sunday.
And so it did.
No comments:
Post a Comment