First Annual
Boulder County Cup

Boulder Tennis Association ekes out the win! The inaugural tournament for the Boulder County Cup (BCC) this year could not have been more fun and highly contested. The BCC is a Davis Cup type team format with the Boulder Tennis Association (BTA) playing against the Centennial Valley Tennis Association (CVTA) in mens, womens and mixed doubles events at all ability levels. The team who wins the most matches takes the title and gets to drink Champagne out of the Cup and have bragging rights until next year.

On a beautiful September Saturday morning, BTA quickly jumped out in the lead, winning the first five matches. CTVA came storming back winning eight out of the next ten matches to take the lead. The late afternoon matches went back and forth and the first day ended tied, with each team winning 12 matches.

Fans watch and root at the final and deciding match.

The Tournament BBQ was held after the Saturday matches and it featured some great BBQ and bratwurst as well as plenty of cold beverages. After everyone was sufficiently fed and "hydrated", a blind serve competition was held, where each contestant put on a blindfold and got three chances to hit a serve into the service box. Amazingly, three people got 2 serves in, and in a 3 round playoff, Eric Witte was able to out-serve the competition and win the prize. Next, a one-serve match tournament was held with the men against the women. The women destroyed the men and quickly eliminated them and the final five women battled it out with Kathy Appel taking the title.

Sunday morning brought breezy conditions to the BCC, but it didn't slow down the competition. There were many long, hard fought matches and with three matches to be played, the overall match score was tied at 22. CVTA took the next match to take a 23 to 22 match lead, but BTA won a tight, three-set mixed doubles match to tie it back up.

The BCC Title had come down to a mens doubles match, with Luis Gutman and Alex Goldstein playing for BTA, against the CVTA team of Jeff Sauter and the wily veteran, Max Galambos. BTA came out strong winning the first set 6-2. CVTA clawed back into the match winning the second set 6-4. The tournament format calls for a 10 point tie-break in lieu of a third set. The Cup will be decided by a third set tie-break! With many members of both teams watching, cheering, hooting and hollering, the tie-break was very tight early as it got to 5-5. Then Luis and Alex poured it on and pulled away winning the tie-break 10-6 and winning the Cup for BTA, 24 matches to 23!

Tournament Director Kim Christopherson and Dave Jansen present the Cup to BTA members.

Thanks to everyone who played in the BCC and who helped out. It was a great weekend of tennis and fun and we know it will be even better and more fun next year.

For more photos, and larger versions of these photos, check out the Photo Gallery.