IronOaks Tennis Club President, Judy Gahide, with the club’s Volunteer of the Year, John Radcliffe
Denise Lott
IronOaks’ Volunteer Recognition dinner is held annually in appreciation of the efforts of its many helpers that keep the club’s activities flowing smoothly. Each year one special volunteer is selected to be recognized and for the 2015 event this was John Radcliffe.
John has been instrumental in developing and maintaining our USTA women’s leagues for the last four years. He currently captains a 55 plus 7.0 team and a 65 plus 7.0 team. As captain he is responsible for the weekly line-ups, scheduling and communications for each group.
Part of his involvement with these teams has him conducting weekly drills for both of the USTA women’s leagues—and another weekly drill for 3.0 ladies. The results of his work are obvious when you see that at least one team has been to USTA Sectionals every year. In the past three out of four years, a team has advanced to Nationals and the 7.0 Women’s 60 won the Nationals in 2012.
Besides working with these groups, John ran the tournament desk for the large Jason Morton event this year and will be assisting with the USTA Southwest Grand Slam event in September.
To further assist his teams, he began stringing their rackets for them. As a Master Racquet Technician certified by the USRSA (United States Racquet Stringers Association), he has now expanded and is available to help anyone with racket stringing.
It is a volunteer like John Radcliffe that helps IronOaks maintain its standing in the local tennis world. Our Tennis Club thanks John and all of the other volunteers who came forward to give their time this year for the benefit of our tennis community.