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Published on 05/19/1999 All articles from this issue

Mountain View Open swings back into action this week

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By Ellen Murray

Special to the Town Crier

Absent for five years from the Peninsula tennis scene, the 31st annual Mountain View Open tournament resurfaces this year on the last two weekends in May.

The tournament begins this Saturday and concludes on Memorial Day, May 31, at the Cuesta Park Tennis Center.

"Fans will have a chance to see a full roster of top-flight tennis in this NorCal-USTA sanctioned event," tournament director Ronald Skyles said.

"The Mountain View Open brings together many top players from local universities and touring pros for men's and women's singles, doubles, and mixed doubles play at one of the finest and most beautiful public venues around."

A transplanted easterner who played tennis for Howard University, Skyles, 43, has breathed new life into the event.

"I became interested in the tournament history and its players - including such past champions as Barry MacKay, Roscoe Tanner Sandy and Gene Mayer, Ann Kiyomzira and Kathy Jordan, who went on to play in the Davis and Federation Cups, and at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open," Skyles said. "And Mountain View's hometown stars like Kate Latham, a five-time Open winner, give an intimate and unique feeling to this tournament."

Spectators will also have a chance to see John Sevely, winner of two Opens, team up with Craig Confield for doubles match play.

Sevely is head pro at Cuesta Tennis Center, which boasts 12 tournament level Courts, ample grandstand seating and amenities such as food and beverage concessions for the tournament duration.

Skyles organized the Open systematically and came up with corporate funding from Santa Clara-based Exodus Communications, a Web site management company, which is providing prize money.

The Mountain View Recreation Department introduced tennis as a participant and spectator sport in the early 1960s. The first Mountain View Open actually took place at San Jose State in 1965, then moved to the Rengstorff Park courts.

The award-winning Cuesta Park Tennis Center replaced Rengstorff as the venue in 1972.

Originally hosted by the recreation department with assistance from the Mountain View Tennis Club, the tournament garnered sponsorship from the Community Services Agency of Mountain View and Los Altos in 1993.

But the Open died when the Mountain View Recreation and Parks Department employee who ran it retired. There hasn't been a tournament since 1994.

"When I couldn't get anyone else to run the tournament, I took it upon myself," said Skyles, who moved here from the Washington, D.C. area when his wife was accepted at Stanford University Law School in 1995. "I was so impressed with the Mountain View Open's history, I thought it should be revived."

Proceeds from the event will benefit the American Cancer Society.

The tournament is dedicated to Skyles' father, the late Benjamin A. Skyles, Sr., an avid tennis player.

Schedule, draw, and participant information are available on the tournament Web site at http://www.mvopen.com.