Chasing Tournament Ranking Points

Fiend at Court Unplugged

When the calendar rolls over to November each year and the USTA Texas Master’s championship has concluded, I start to scan my mail box for the Texas Tennis Tournament Guide for the coming season. Each year the Texas Section Office mails out a catalog that contains a list of the tournaments scheduled for the coming year.

The list of tournaments is sorted by the number of points awarded to the winner of each tournament. For example, the first entry in the list in 2020 was “600 Point Tournaments” which included the Sectional Championships and the Masters. The second group was labeled “400 Point Tournaments – Major Zones.” My experience is that the players in Texas were generally not confused by the structure and points of the tournaments.

The points and naming conventions in 2021 will be different. Discussion of the changes and the likely impact on playing decisions is being pushed off to next weekend. Today I am describing my own shameless pursuit of points.

San Angelo

There is a Major Zone tournament in San Angelo every year. In Texas, Major Zones are worth 400 ranking points. The rankings list in Texas currently counts a player’s “Best Five” tournaments. That will change in 2021 when the number counted goes to six. The USTA believes that the increased number will encourage more players to play. I am not sure it will make that much of a difference in Texas. The majority of highly ranked players typically play a lot more than 5 events already.

In any case, this is why find myself in San Angelo almost every year. It is usually an opportunity to score some relatively easy points due to small draw sizes. Additionally, I really like the tennis playing community in San Angelo. The people who play tennis in San Angelo are a cheerful and hardy bunch. Good people.

Tournament participation in San Angelo for the Major Zone pretty much consists of players who are local to the area, players with family and friends in San Angelo, and players who are unabashedly chasing ranking points. It is not exactly a tourism hot spot and can be a tough sell to a non-playing spouse.

According to the the Discover San Angelo web site, San Angelo averages slightly over twenty inches of rain per year. I can personally attest that the majority of the rainfall occurs during the annual Major Zone tournament. I have never played a tournament in San Angelo that was not impacted by rain.

The Discover San Angelo also lists the yearly average temperature as 65 degrees. I laughed out loud when I encountered that fact. It is probably true, but only because the temperature in San Angelo is usually either 100 or 30 during the tournament. In fact, the Fiend at Court spousal unit recently forwarded me photos from the tournament in 2019 where he was wearing shorts for his match on Friday and a hoodie and a ski cap on Saturday.

In related news, when I was cleaning out my closet earlier this year, I discovered that I owned three windbreakers. All three were purchased under weather induced duress during the San Angelo tournament. Apparently remembering to always pack a windbreaker for San Angelo is beyond my cognitive abilities. I have culled my collection down to one. The last remaining windbreaker is now permanently housed in the back of my car.

Coincidently, I would note that Discover San Angelo does not provide any statistics on average wind velocity. Probably it is only windy during tournaments as well.

It’s Enough to Drive One to Drink

The banner photo with this post was taken in the middle of the Women’s 5.0 singles finals at the 2019 San Angelo tournament. It… may be my favorite mid-match action shot ever.

There were only two entries in the Women’s 5.0 draw. Per ranking point rules, we were to play a single match. The winner received 400 points and the loser received 300. Those are the current rules around ranking points. You see, when I say that there are relatively easy rankings points to be won in San Angelo, what I really could have said was “free.”

Well, “free” other than the time spent driving to and from San Angelo and the cost of the hotel. Due to the relatively small draw, I was able to captain my team league match in Fort Worth Saturday morning before driving out to San Angelo for the late afternoon finals.

We played four games on Saturday and I was leading 3-1 when the rains came. This gave me and my opponent a chance to abscond with the beer keg which was being delivered for the player party. (Just a photo op, folks.) We also enjoyed a lovely dinner together at a casual-fast café.

The next morning we watched it drizzle until noon when we decided that there probably wasn’t going to be a break in the weather. I forfeited the match so we could both embark on our respective drives home. That move guaranteed us the rankings points which would not have been awarded if the tournament had been declared to be a wash out without a completed match.

Naturally within 30 minutes of making that decision, the rains stopped and the sun came out. You’re welcome, San Angelo Major Zone tournament. You’re welcome.

The Points Chase

I feel like I need to reiterate that I love the players, the facility, and the general fact that there is a Major Zone tournament in San Angelo. Tennis should not be an exclusively urban privilege.

That being said, I doubt that I ever would have played the tournament in San Angelo ever if not for the opportunity to win those ranking points. It is a part of the calculation that goes into my tournament calendar. If I get enough points in San Angelo then it is easier for me to pass on the Major Zone in Corpus Christi.

In fact, if I ever play Corpus Christi with enough regularity to pen an ode to the city similar to the one for San Angelo above, it will be an indication that something has gone horribly wrong in my early season points chase and performance.

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1. Climate – Weather in the Concho Valley, Discover San Angelo! Website, viewed 10/31/2020.