Hello, this is the only place I can really mention this I guess and I cant do anything about it but it is just a quick message to say about the age grouping on lta tournaments and have peoples opinions on this.
It is regarding the age groups of lta tournament from september to december this year, the fact that each age group if of that next year. Eg Under 16's is 1993 birthday or earlyer, and under 12's is 1997 or earlyer.
But what about this situation? However I am still 15!! yes my birthday is in november, and yet I cant play an under 16's because my birthday is 1992. I am even still on the under 16's ranking on the computer, so why not make the under 16's ranking cutoff for people on the 1st september as noone can add to their total of ranking points if they are born after that yet still under 16's.
Yet someone who is january 1993 has almost a whole year of playing under 16's when they are 16 next year.
This has always been a problem, but by making it like this it has made it 10x worse.
I hope someone cares, because this has really angered me!!
Can you give more details, like who said you couldn't play (was it the LTA or the competiton organsier).
I've been playing in LTA competitons for about 5 years now but never have played in the winter so I have had no experience of whether this rule is true or not.
Well I have come to expect this sort of rubbish from the LTA, they have no clue when it comes to developing grass roots tennis, and how to get people involved in competitive play.
It does seem very strange that they don't make this change on 1st January to tie in with the age rules.
I don't understand why it applies from September to December, especially as it would appear to stop someone say earning ranking points etc. when they are really still in the right age category.
However, in essence in age group tennis, you are always at a bit of a disadvantage being born late in the year, and frankly that's just bad luck ( blame your Mum and Dad ).
Also, last year as a 14 yo, presumably some guys then aged 15 had to move in to the 16 yo category, and hence ceased to be competition from September to December. So it kind of works for and against you. It just seems to me to be advancing the process by 4 months unnecessarily, and i don't understand at all why.
).
