Tennis

Season: August to October

Email: tennis@somdmontgomery.org

Overview:

We offer Skills, Singles, Unified doubles, and Traditional Doubles Teams (where both team members are Special Olympic athletes). Training consists of basic tennis skills with the goal of advancing each player to mixed doubles with a Unified Partner, or to Traditional Doubles.

Like mainstream tennis, Special Olympics Tennis gives athletes the opportunity to learn and perform a variety of skills that can be played throughout life.  In addition to offering traditional singles and doubles events, Special Olympics offers individual skills competition to allow athletes to train and compete in basic tennis skills before advancing to playing tennis matches.  These skills include racket bounce, “ups,” forehand volley, backhand groundstroke, serve-deuce court, serve-advantage court, and alternating groundstroke with movement.

CoachesHead Coach – Cindy Rich
Additional Coaches Needed
Team Manager
– Claire Louis
Season Dates & TimesPractices: Every Sunday afternoon starting August 13, 2023, to October 15, 2023 4:00 pm-5:30 pm
August 13th, 20th, & 27th at Walter Johnson
September 10th, & 17th at Walter Johnson
September 27th, at Wootton High School
October 1st, 8th, & 15th at Walter Johnson

Qualifiers: Required Qualifier October 1, 2023, at Towson University
Level 5 Qualifier October 8, 2023, at Turf Valley in Ellicott City

State Games: Fall Fest October 21, 2023, Mt. St. Mary’s in Emmitsburg
Medical & Volunteer
Expiration Date
Sport’s State Games competition date: October 21, 2023

The expiration date on an athlete’s Medical form, or a Volunteer’s certification, must be after October 16, 2022

Check athlete status here.
Check volunteer status here.

Special Olympics Resources for Tennis

Equipment: Athletes will need to provide their own tennis racket. SOMO does have a few that we can lend out if needed.  SOMO will also provide tennis balls. Athletes should bring a water bottle to practice as it can get very hot on the courts.

Uniform Requirements: SOMO will provide new athletes a SOMO shirt for Tennis Qualifiers and State Competition.  Athletes must also wear black tennis shorts and tennis shoes with white socks for competition.

Practice Overview: 

  • Location: Walter Johnson High School (WJHS), 6400 Rock Spring Drive, Bethesda, MD and Wooton High School, 2100 Wootton Pky., Rockville, MD
  • The Coach will assign athletes to practice sessions by ability. There is no practice Labor Day weekend. Athletes should arrive 15 minutes early to allow time to check in and be prepared to warmup.
  • Activities: Practice will begin with warmups, then be broken into groups for skills and match play.

Qualifiers:  Required qualifier – tentative date, first weekend in October at Towson University. Additional qualifiers to be announced later.

State Competition:  Fall Festival held at Mt. St. Mary’s University, 16300 Old Emmitsburg Rd., Emmitsburg, MD 21727

Eligibility for State Competition: Athletes must attend the required qualifier and one other qualifier to be eligible for competition at Fall Fest.  Athletes must also have no unexcused absences from practices.

Participation in other SOMO Sports: Athletes can participate in other SOMO sports so long as the athlete can maintain full practice participation in all of their sports.