Western Tournament Heads South

Rain dampens morning but not social November Tournament Director Irene Muzio's hard work was washed
away with the storm, but she nonetheless pulled a few tricks out of her various hats.

"There's three things that can happen in a ballgame: you can win, you can lose, or it can rain. "
- Casey Stengel

The bad news: a well-timed storm raced through the Bay Area early Saturday morning and rendered courts unplayable. The good news: the weather brightened up later in the day, we still had a fine western-themed social and Irene and Jay Muzio employed their own version of Strat-O-Matic Tennis to determine the winners of the first-ever RSTC virtual tourney.

In the exciting and upset-filled pseudo-competition, Annette Vernon and Rudi Kain rallied to snag top prizes while Kathy Miles and Sreejit Narayan garnered seconds honors. This prototype event proved popular with members and may be employed in future to place more emphasis on social activity and less on the actual physical aspects of running around and playing tennis. Another example of constant and continual innovation from the RSTC!

As for the social, hosts Kristian Nergaard and Doug McCracken [aka, the barefoot cowpoke] generously provided their home [and their range] as partygoers feasted on a variety of chuckwagon delicacies that filled and warmed on a cool night. So much so in fact, that spontaneous episodes of line dancing were reported to have broken out. Said one observer of the scene, "They cowboy'd up and now they're partying down!"

Virtual winners Rudi & Annette celebrate with real smiles.

Second place finishers Kathy and Sreejit model their hats.