A great week for celebrating the Earth and tennis
This next week is going to be a pretty big week in Rome and Floyd County. It’s Earth Week and it’s the week of the Atlantic Coast Conference men’s and women’s tennis championships at the Rome Tennis Center at Berry College.
The Earth Week events will begin on Tuesday with a 2:30 p.m. National Arbor Day celebration at Etowah Park. Wednesday, Brian Roberts will lead a Get to Know Your Watershed event at noon at Lock & Dam Park in the Nature Center at the Trading Post.
Thursday, which is actually the
51st anniversary of Earth Day, the Rome-floyd Recycling Center on Lavender Drive will offer tours from 3 to 5 p.m. Friday, the Rome Floyd ECO Center in Ridge Ferry Park will conduct special programming between 1 p.m. and 4 p.m.
The week will culminate Saturday with a Celebrate Trail Day hike at the GE Trails at Garrard Park at 9:30 a.m. Darlington School science teacher Owen Kinney will lead the hike on the Bob and Peggy Moore Hiking Trail.
The TRED walk will start a summer-long series. The May 29 walk, led by Romefloyd Senior Planner Brice Wood, will take folks through the River District of downtown Rome.
Exercise coach Millie Lockley will lead people out the Kingfisher Trail on June 26. Dr. Jimmy Douglas will lead a walk on the Mt. Berry Trail July 31.
Keep Rome Floyd Beautiful Director Emma Wells will lead the Aug. 28 walk along the Ridge Ferry Park Trail while TRED leaders will take folks on trails that criss-cross Jackson Hill on Sept. 25.
It’s really very heartening to see folks out on the trails every day in Rome. I try to walk at least twice a day — and try to get in at least two miles on each walk.
By the way, a couple of weeks ago I mentioned in this space that I was willing to make the first $100 donation to help plant some trees and flowers to brighten up the trail through Ridge Ferry Park. Since then I’ve had three members of the Rome Rotary Club say they would match my $100, so we’ve got $400 in the bank to help make the trails a little more colorful in the future.
If you’d like to know more, or make a pledge, just give me a call or shoot me an email and I’ll make sure the City Tree Board gets hooked up with you.
Big time tennis coming to Rome
The ACC tennis championships begin Wednesday and will continue through Sunday.
This will be some of the best tennis the NCAA has to offer. Unfortunately, unless you’ve signed up for some volunteer work, the tournament will be closed to the general public out of a sense of safety for players.
The women’s teams include unbeaten No. 1 ranked North Carolina; FSU at No. 4; NC State at No. 5; Virginia at No. 11; Georgia Tech at No. 14; and Duke at No. 16.
On the men’s side, North Carolina checks in at No. 3, Virginia at No. 5 and Wake Forest at No. 10.
The Carolina men were unbeaten much of the season but fell to both Virginia and Wake Forest in recent weeks to topple out of the No. 1 spot.
Don’t be fooled, the Heels are very good. Two of their top players, Rinky Hijikata and Josh Peck, have been injured recently and out of the lineup. To be honest with you, I haven’t been able to learn the extent of their injuries or if they expect to play in Rome. If they are back in the lineup, UNC will be hard to beat.
There are a number of highly ranked individual players who will be on the courts in Rome next week.
On the women’s side, seven of the top 10 NCAA women play for ACC schools. No. 1 is Emma Navarro of Virginia, followed by Sara Daavettila of UNC at No. 2.
Estela Perez-somarriba of Miami, the defending NCAA singles champion is No. 3. Anna Rogers of NC State is No. 5; Kenya Jones of Georgia Tech is No. 6; Natasha Subhash of the University of Virginia is No. 9; and Giulia Pairone of Florida State University is ranked 10th this week.
Over on the men’s side Virginia’s Carl Soderlund, a Swede in graduate school, is ranked No. 5. Henri Squire of Wake Forest is No. 11. Alexis Galarneu of NC State is No. 19 this week.
It’s a crying shame that the general public will not be able to get into the event this year, though I can see folks putting up lawn chairs along the fence and at least watching matches on the six NCAA championship courts nearest the parking lot.
In theory, college coaches are supposed to play their top athletes in order of their ranking during the six singles matches that are part of the team match. Stacking the line-up doesn’t always guarantee that happens and coaches can appeal the line-ups that are given to tournament officials, but I’m not familiar with anyone ever-changing the line-up as a result of such an appeal.
That’s doesn’t mean it hasn’t happened, I’m just not aware of it. It’s harder to get away with at the top of the line-up than it is at the bottom.
Anyway, this is gonna be a great week to be outside in Rome.
Say a prayer for good weather. If it rains, some of the tennis matches may have to be moved to Atlanta or Chattanooga.