Legal Weed at Ivory Crockett Park
On a very hot afternoon in June we headed to Ivory Crockett Park in Webster Groves, Missouri. This park was very convenient for Scott since it is located a few blocks from his office. Ivory Crockett Park is the center of a primarily African American section of Webster Groves and is named for the famed sprinter Ivory Crockett who still holds the record for the fastest manual timed 100 yard dash in history.
At this point Scott has given up on trying to beat Stan straight up and so for this match a new challenge was devised. Jason Mathes donated a Weed racket to The East St. Louis Community Tennis Association Library so we decided that each player would play a set “on” Weed before the racket went into the Library. This was thought to be a disadvantage as the Weed Racket is the largest legal racket at 135 sq. inches and is primarily used by senior players.
As got out of our cars we noticed a police car adjacent to the courts – steeped in our own privilege we walked right up to the car to show the officer we had some legal Weed. The cop unimpressed told us to lock our cars implying this was a “bad” neighborhood. As we walked to the court we immediately noticed that although Webster Groves is an affluent community this single court needed some attention. However the park does have bathrooms right next to the court which is always a plus.
We began the warm up and each of us tried the Weed for the first time and noticed it had a lot of firepower and less control. Short warm up completed we then spun the racket for serve and Scott won and made the decision to have Stan play the first set with the Weed and serve first.
Stan responded by blazing an ace right off the bat and won the first game at love with beautiful modified strokes. Scott remained dazed and confused during the first set as Stan hit a myriad of beautiful shots to win the first set 6-0. So much for the Weed penalty…..
Meanwhile our friendly police officer who kept a watchful eye over us for the first set as well as a group of folk under a nearby pavilion finally moved on.
So Scott’s turn to have a hit with the Weed started inauspiciously as Stan again fired off an ace to win the first point of the second set. Stan went on to hold but then Scott inhaled deeply and unleashed the a flurry of Weed bombs to finally win a game. 1-1. All of the sudden a competitive match was in the offing with each player holding serve until 4-3 Stan.
Scott was using the magic of the Weed to take control of the points and put Stan on the defensive. Then Stan got the break he needed and was ready to serve out the match. Scott sparked up a powerful barrage of ground strokes to get 3 break points. Stan serving at love-40 looked like he was going to let Scott back in the match. Stan resolved to beat the Weed responded with some great points to come back and win the game, set and match at 6-0,6-3
Now that we were finished with the Weed we got out some beer and enjoyed Chomo-Lungma, Seventh Son, Zwickel and Budweiser Freedom Reserve while the sweet smell of herb wafted across the court from elsewhere in the park. Although we decided not to eat when we finished if we did the only choice after this match would be Pizza and there are many great choices within a mile of these courts including Farrottos, Katies, Racanelli’s, Deweys and Jets Pizza.
Court condition was a 5 with surfacing needed, net straps, net adjustment however we really did not experience many bad bounces at all. Location is a 10 for a 7.5 average. As we left the courts we noticed the cops had never left but had just moved location and continued to keep a watchful eye over this park and its people.
