Inner-City Games sparks big tennis clinic turnout

Friday, May 16, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.

SUN STAFF REPORTS

The 1997 Greater Las Vegas Inner-City Games will continue in full swing with the first tennis clinic 9 a.m. to noon Saturday at Rancho High School, 1900 E. Owens Ave.

More than 400 Las Vegas youths are expected to participate and learn the fundamentals of tennis during two weeks of clinics. They will then test their skills in the tennis competition June 7 at UNLV.

For the second consecutive year, the tennis clinic will be coordinated by the George MacCall Youth Tennis Foundation. Longtime tennis official and promoter George MacCall will lead the clinics. MacCall, the captain for the U.S. Davis Cup team of 1965-67 and commissioner of World Team Tennis in 1973-74, is happy to be involved with the Inner-City Games.

"This program has worked out to be one of the best in the entire nation," MacCall said. "We have registered 1,700 local kids to participate in the tennis clinics. In all my years in tennis, I have never seen anything develop like this."

To accommodate the large number of participants, the tennis program will use 16 USTA professionals and 200 volunteers from the Inner-City Games network.

MacCall believes the program is the best thing that could happen to inner-city tennis.

"About 75 percent of the participants are under 10 years of age," he said. "This allows us to get the kids involved at a young age and build up the inner-city tennis network."

MacCall said follow-up programs have been established to keep the kids involved in tennis throughout the year.

Tennis is the third sports segment offered by the Inner-City Games. From now until Sept. 6, the Games will also conduct summer clinics and competitions in track and field, hip-hop dance, volleyball, swimming and basketball. The sporting events allow the participants to acquire new skills and remain active in a supervised environment during the summer vacation.

The Greater Las Vegas Inner-City Games is a festival of free sporting events designed for those who traditionally may not have an opportunity to participate in organized programs. All of the events of the Games offer a positive, healthy and rewarding alternative to gangs, drugs and violence.