Annual tennis tournament hosted by UCLA showcases the interdepartmental, community teamwork that makes it happen
By Sara Salam
Aug. 3, 2008 9:06 p.m.
During the summer months, the summit of Bruin Walk has a regular traffic flow of young ones making their way to sports camp and summer school students shuffling to class.
This week, however, the typical scene will temporarily take a back seat to the needs and necessities of the Countrywide Classic tennis tournament.
This week, tennis greats from around the world will make UCLA their home as they compete for the tournament title.
This week, things are different.
At first glance, it may seem like this tournament unilaterally intercedes with the daily functions of all campus departments.
It does.
Hosting an event such as the Countrywide Classic requires that communication between UCLA’s individual departments flows smoothly and on a consistent basis.
Michael Deluca, the director of UCLA Recreation, alludes to the importance of maintaining open communication lines to ensure the success of such a multifaceted plan.
“You can’t just airlift this in,” Deluca said of setting up for the tournament. “There’s a lot of logistics that go along with this. We coordinate with all the other great partners on campus: CTO, Parking, Facilities, ASUCLA, Athletics when appropriate, to obviously run and operate it.”
The setup process has spanned a period of about three weeks, during which time party rental trucks, lighting crews and the like have turned the Los Angeles Tennis Center into a stage fit for champions.
Because of the way the tournament dates fell this year, adjustments had to be made to accommodate all parties affected by the event’s presence.
Typically, the Countrywide Classic has been scheduled for the third or fourth week of July, at an earlier slot in the U.S. Open series leading up to Flushing Meadows. The tournament’s dates are planned at the discretion of the ATP and are based on a number of factors, ranging from TV schedules and player fields to potential travel logistics.
This year, the tournament overlaps with the start of football practice, requiring an additional amount of cooperation between Athletics and Recreation.
Deluca said that due to the layout of the various facilities in this particular quadrant of campus, adjustments related to athlete accessibility have been implemented.
“For football and other athletic training, particularly with the synergy of the Acosta Center, there’s a lot of planning relating to the general athlete entrance and exit and training schedules for the teams,” Deluca said.
Deluca went on to describe the specific strategies used to get around the timing complications posed by the simultaneous occurrences of the two events.
“Behind some of those tenting and awning areas, there are hidden gates so that the team can get out and around,” Deluca said.
“Their home facility is, in particular this first week of fall camp, really important to the team and the university.”
Senior Associate Athletic Director Ken Weiner, who is in charge of business operations, shares a similar perspective on the end of the Athletic Department in terms of negotiating the use of this section of campus throughout this next week.
“We’ve asked football time to work around the tennis time, because tennis is set because it’s televised,” Weiner said. “Tennis and blow horns don’t mix.”
Recreation and the Athletic Department have cooperated on a number of projects on campus.
Currently, they are working together on the renovation of Pauley Pavilion and the construction of the Spieker Aquatics Center.
In addition to conflicts over match and practice times, construction and parking always seem to be an issue. But there are ways to alleviate the strain.
“If an event is displacing something on campus, coming up with a way to offset it is clearly one of the variables,” Deluca said. “Maintaining the ongoing university programs is a big key.”
Collaborations are abound whenever UCLA is in the mix. The Countrywide Classic is no different.
The Countrywide Classic, originally called the Pacific Southwest Tennis Open, became a fixture in UCLA’s schedule of events almost 25 years ago.
It was then that the university and the Southern California Tennis Association combined forces with two goals in mind: to construct a new tennis complex for the Bruin varsity teams and a permanent home for the Pacific Southwest Tennis Open.
Then-UCLA Chancellor Charles Young and the chairman of the Thrifty Corporation, Leonard Straus, were the masterminds behind the proposal, encouraged by UCLA and SCTA supporter Ron Katz.
Soon after an agreement was reached, it became known that tennis was going to be integrated into the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, and a stadium was needed to host the matches.
Thus an arrangement was made between SCTA and UCLA, as well as by the Los Angeles Olympic Organizing Committee, to raise the funds for the project.
The $7.25 million plan was broken into three parts. $3.25 million came in the form of gifts from SCTA supporters. $2 million came from UCLA’s rental payments from the LAOOC for the Olympic Village, which was matched by pledges from other UCLA sources.
The plan also has a revenue-sharing clause, stating that the university will get a share of the profits as part of their share in the project.
“For the university, it’s not so much a cost factor, it’s what are the income sources,” Deluca said.
This includes food sales, parking and tickets sales, among other things. The revenue from these sales partly goes to the upkeep of the tennis center, such as maintaining court surfaces and installing new nets.
UCLA and SCTA have been working in conjunction with each other for a quarter of a century, and will continue to do so until their 99-year contract expires.
And within the UCLA community itself, cooperative efforts are always part of the discussion.
The Countrywide Classic epitomizes the teamwork characteristic of UCLA’s administration, and allows the university to make a name for itself on the tennis circuit and throughout the world.
“It gives a great representation of the university and the community,” Deluca said. “The university’s name is part of the worldwide market in the sport of tennis. Not many universities get the chance of having such an event on campus.”
