On Saturday, January 24, 2015, Cal tennis (both men's and women's) took a major step forward. They unveiled major upgrades to their facilities, including upgraded locker rooms. I attended the event and felt like I had a major role to play despite the fact that I had literally no role to play. But I was thanked by all the various speakers for all the hard work and effort I put in. So, you're welcome, Cal tennis! I'd do it all over again!
In the photos here, we have all the speakers, including Michael Williams, Cal AD, Peter Wright, Cal Men's Tennis Coach, Kent Newmark, a Cal tennis legend, Chase Melton, the captain of the current team, Amanda Augustus, Cal Women's Tennis Coach, and John Wilton, everybody's boss. The tenor of the speeches was generally enthusiastic. Apparently, the previous facilities were extremely poor. Given that hated rival Stanford always has luxury, it was frustrating to have so little. Now, similar to the football stadium, we have a facility that can match the others.
They talked about the great level of success that both tennis squads have had. The wall behind the speakers has lists of the former tennis greats. Thanks to Cal historian CalBear81, we've actually written on some of them, including Helen Wills and Hazel Hotchkiss Wightman. Cal has had a lot of success at tennis and it is reflected on the wall there. The Cal legend talked about how things have changed since he was at Cal. The current team captain talked about the lessons he learned at Cal.
After the speeches, we had an opportunity to tour the grounds. There are photos here of the coaches offices. There is a photo of a new machine on the court. This machine organizes video and stats of the games so that the players can break it all down. It is extremely thorough and had information on seemingly every aspect of the game. When we went up to look at it, there were a few players looking at it with a representative from the company that produces the machine. The players were enthralled and excited by all the difference video angles at which you could re-watch games. They seemed excited looking at different stats on speech of shots and the spin etc etc. I'm hopeful that this will help the team improve.
Then, we went and toured the locker rooms. They were extremely nice. I have photos here of the men's locker rooms. We briefly went into the women's locker rooms. I didn't take any photos of the women's locker rooms, because that seemed fairly creepy. So, let me apologize to my creepster readers that I have no photos. Sorry!
All in all, it was an extremely exciting evening and a great opportunity to see the next era in Cal tennis. Congratulations to both tennis teams and GO BEARS!