Monday, July18th, 1977 Washington, D.C.

We made it back to Bowie late last night, we hung out at the tournament until the last afternoon matches then we had dinner in Georgetown. We called Mark’s uncle to pick us up. We were exhausted and went straight to bed…but talked an hour in the dark about the players we had watched.

I think of all the players I was most impressed with Dibbs and Solomon…they seem to have less to work with. Neither looks athletic but I understand Dibbs was a boxer at one time. Both are short but very fast, both are so accurate with their groundstrokes. Dibbs was eating Raul Ramirez up, even though Ramirez has amazing shots, he is a very smooth player, but the deep shots on the baseline forced him into errors.

We got up early and read the Washington Post, the sports page had all the results and excellent feature stories on the players, perfect reading with the cold cereal. Sandy and I had at least 3 bowls of cheerios! Its going to be humid and hot today. We’re supposed to meet Mr. B and the camp buses at 10:30.

It’s 10:30 pm now and Im back in Mercersburg. Former Camper Marie Reagan picked us up and drove us to Rock Creek in her VW convertible. We got there just as the bus pulled in, we had the tickets and passed them out. Mr. B asked us how we liked the box seats and we told them all about the cool matches we watched. He invited me to sit in the box in the afternoon and we sat through a match but when the temps reached above the 90 mark Mr. B. packed up and headed back to Mercersburg. I got to stay in the box the rest of the afternoon and watched Raul Ramirez carve up Jeff Austin from UCLA. Then we watched Bernie Mitton play Ricardo Cano of Argentina. Cano moonballed him every single shot and easily beat him.

I’m very surprised by all the drop shots and lobs, on this green clay the easiest pattern to hit into is the deep short pattern and everyone was using it, the hard hitters are at a huge disadvantage here. We went over to a side court and watched that kid from Long Island play. McEnroe although just 18 is so good and get this its as if he’s toying with people. He passes with ease, his lobs are deadly, I have never seen volleys like this with a serve that breaks both ways. I was so impressed.

I have a horrible sore throat and am very tired, I think all the excitement and travel has worn me out and worse yet I have to work tomorrow! We have a whole new crop of campers that we have yet to meet.

Whew, Mr. B just dropped by asked me to help out with the video taping tomorrow. So I have something to look forward to, Sheridan must have told him I was sick, Tom is always looking out for me, I swear. Kunz will tape until 10:30 and then I get to run the camera until noon. This is by far the best job because I get to shoot video while Mr. B tells stories and I know he will have a lot to say after the Washington Star. Mr. B like me because Im the best listener in the camp and by far he's the best story teller!

I saw Mr. B talking to Gene Mayer at one point during the tournament. Roger Dickinson was there and got to talk him as well. Roger is from Franklin Lakes and Gene and the Mayers are local heros. Roger was telling me that he knows their Dad. Mr. B told me a bunch of interesting stories about their Dad, Mr. Meyer, I guess he was the classic tournament father in that he worked them relentlessly, hard to believe because those boys are so nice, but we can’t choose our parents.