The United States Tennis Association Indoor Championships for women ages 70 and older will be held at Club Green Meadows beginning Wednesday.
The tournament will feature 44 women from around the nation, including two of the most successful women in the history of the sport.
Dodo Cheney and Betty Cookson have teamed to play for the 90-and-older doubles championship. Cheney, 96, is a member of the International Tennis Federation Hall of Fame and was the first American woman to win the Australian Championship.
Cookson, 90, was a world champion in doubles for women 65 and older in 1993.
Opposing Cheney and Cookson will be Vancouver’s Martha Frederick and Lovie Beard from Houston. The match is scheduled for 11 a.m. Thursday.
At 1 p.m. on Friday, Frederick will play Beard for the 90-and-older singles title. Frederick, who turns 91 in December, won the singles title at this tournament last September.
She said she is looking forward to the match against Cheney and Cookson, in addition to trying to repeat as the 90-and-older indoor singles champion.Kaye Goheen of Battle Ground is scheduled to play in the 70s doubles tournament.
Girlfriends Half is Sunday
The sixth Girlfriends Half Marathon will be held on Sunday morning in downtown Vancouver.
The women-only race begins at 9 a.m. at 1011 Broadway, in front of Northwest Personal Training which stages the 13.1-mile run and walk.
The race benefits two organizations focused on curing breast cancer and assisting those stricken with breast cancer: Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the Kearney Breast Care Center.
The first Girlfriends Half Marathon in October of 2007 was limited to 400 participants. It sold out. Last fall the event drew 3,000 runners and walkers and raised more than $70,000 for its charities.Registration continues through Saturday and now costs $80. To learn more, visit www.nwpersonaltraining.com.
Pickleball event draws 100 players
Clark County resident Enrique Ruiz beat highly-ranked Don Paschall of Tukwila to win the singles title at the Pickle Barrel Classic pickleball tournament, which was held Sept. 29-30 at Firstenburg Community Center in Vancouver.
Ruiz and Paschall competed for the 5.0 skill level title.
Tournament organizers said more than 100 players participated in the event, from first-timers to national champions. Tournaments were held in seven skill divisions for singles and doubles for men and women and in mixed doubles.
A list of medal winners from Clark County is in the Community Sports Scoreboard.n Also in the Community Sports Scoreboard are results from the most recent tennis tournament in the Players/VTC Grand Slam Series. The U.S. Open Doubles Tournament was played Oct. 5-7 at the Vancouver Tennis Center.
Langsdorf scores for Timbers Academy
Foster Langsdorf of Vancouver scored his first goal of the season Saturday as the Portland Timbers Academy under-18 team tied Real So Cal 1-1 at the Adidas Timbers Training Center in Beaverton.
At home for the first time, the Timbers U-18s also beat Arsenal FC 1-0 on Sunday.In under-16 matches, the Timbers Academy defeated Real So Cal 3-2 and tied with Arsenal 1-1.
Grant aids blind athletes
The Northwest Association for Blind Athletes has been awarded a $5,000 grant from the Nike Employee Grant Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation. The grant will help to support the organization’s Equipment Expansion Project.
According to Billy Henry, executive director for the NWABA, said the project has a total goal of raising $25,000 to purchase equipment needed to expand its sports programs for individuals who are blind and visually impaired.
“Our Equipment Expansion Project will allow our programs to serve more individuals through several different sports and fitness activities,” Henry said. “We hope to raise the remaining funds to finish the project by June 2013.”
The NWABA is a Vancouver-based organization that organizes and promotes sports and fitness for blind and visually impaired people. To learn more, visit www.nwaba.org.
COMMUNITY SPORTS NEWS is published each Tuesday. To submit items, send e-mail to paul.danzer@columbian.com, or call 360-735-4521.
