By Lya Wodraska, Athens Magazine, November 1995
It's the middle of tennis boot camp at Bishop Park and time is running out. “Hurry up, pick up those balls, we've got to get moving,” Stacey Venker yells. “Go, go, go, go!”
Time always seems short for Stacey. Whether she's teaching tennis or enjoying her other favorite pastime of golf, Stacey is always on the go. Over the past eight years Stacey's “keep-on-moving” philosophy has turned Bishop Park into one of the most active tennis areas in the community.
After running a small tennis program in Oconee County in 1987, Stacey persuaded Bishop Park to let her start a tennis program in '88. She began with about 50 participants. Now the program boasts over 300 avid students.
The Bishop Park administration added three courts to bring its total to nine in 1991. In addition, the program expanded to include lessons at Satterfield Park. Stacey, who is single, is virtually married to her job as she spends up to 12 hours a day at Bishop Park.
Marty Johnston, Bishop Park's recreation manager, is still amazed at the transformation Stacey has brought about. “At the time Stacey came to us, we had a small program but we weren't trying to build a big program,” Marty says. “We just wanted to maintain the status quo. After Stacey took over, we were all astounded at how quickly it grew. Overnight, it seemed like we had a big tennis program.”
Marty explains, “Stacey has this belief that tennis is something the whole community could participate in. She wants everybody playing the game. It's unusual to find a tennis facility in a recreational setting that is run like one you'd find in a country club, but that's what Stacey has built.”
Stacey has developed tennis lessons for children as young as four, seniors as old as 80, and everyone in between. There are boot camps — week long lessons for adults. There are special nights for men's classes and regular round-robin tournaments for all ages.
In 1989 Stacey was instrumental in creating the Athens Junior Tennis League, which, along with Bishop Park, the YMCA and area country clubs, promotes several tennis tournaments for junior players.
“I'm just giving people what they want and ask for,” Stacey says with a shrug of her shoulders. “I listen to what people ask and say in practice and then try to fill that need. A lot of it has to do with making sure there is a level at which everyone can play. It's like the programs we have leading up to the AJTL; everyone needs stepping stones to move up.”
“One of the best things that Stacey has done is make the sport available to everyone,” Marty says. “Everyone can't afford to belong to a country club to play tennis. When Stacey first came here, she used all of the available vehicles to promote the program, like brochures and running adds in newspapers.”
“But she also did a lot of other things such as offer free clinics to spread the word,” Marty continues. “I remember her going into the gymnastics classes and taking that child sitting in the stands whose sister was taking gymnastics and sticking a racquet in his hand and showing him what the game was like.”
Of course, one can stick a racquet in a child's hand, but only a good teacher is going to keep it there. And therein lies the real truth of Stacey's success. She combines her “go, go” attitude with the necessary patience required to teach a technical skill.
Some students have nicknamed the 31-year-old “the General” for the way she runs practice. There's little time for gabbing as a “learn-it-and-move-it” atmosphere prevails.
“She's very enthusiastic,” says one student, Amy Benson. “She just makes you want to do well and do more than you might do otherwise. She's very inspiring and a good motivator.”
Of all of the programs she has started, Stacey is most proud of the seniors program, which has 18 students.
“It's such a thrill to see them enjoying a game that many hadn't played before,” she says. “Many were never athletes growing up, so we had to start out slow, sometimes even just throwing the ball to them to let them hit it. But now they're to the point were they can play the game and are actually working on putting the ball away. They have a blast competing with each other.”
From the sound of it, Stacey's senior students enjoy the lessons as much as Stacey enjoys giving them. Take George Koch for instance, who decided to try taking lessons from Stacey because of his wife's participation.
“I've never been that athletic,” George says. “I tried taking lessons 20 years ago, but the instructor wasn't willing to work with me at my level and I got frustrated. But Stacey is so patient that she helps you make progress at your own level.”
“I can't say enough about Stacey,” says another senior student, Despy Karlas. “I believe she could teach anyone anything. She has that type of personality. She knows what to say at the right time. Stacey's very caring; she obviously loves what she's doing.”
Her United States Tennis Association teams have been successful too. In 1990, Stacey coached one team to the national championship.
Stacey, who was a member of the Clemson tennis team before transferring to the University of Georgia, never took any special courses on how to teach tennis. She found herself teaching in much the same way she learned the game. She was always interested in sports and active outdoors because of her grandfather's influence.
“He's another one that couldn't sit still,” Stacey says. “He's the one who took me out and played catch with me. He always wanted to know what we were going to do next.”
Stacey discovered tennis while hanging out at the local golf course in her hometown of St. Louis, Mo. The golf course was situated next to the tennis courts and Stacey spent much of her time watching tennis players She soon moved from watching groups play to joining them.
With the support of her parents, Harry and Joy, Stacey honed her playing skills under Alex Mayer, who coached tennis legends Evonne Goolagong, a four time winner of the Australian Open, and 1977 Wimbledon winner Virginia Wade.
It's no surprise that with Stacey's personality she was a serve-and-volley-er. “I guess I just liked getting the points over with,” she says. “I wasn't patient enough to stay back on the baseline and rally.”
While thankful for the chance to learn from Alex Mayer, Stacey didn't agree with the way he taught. “He made people tough by breaking them down and then building them back up,” Stacey says. “It worked for him but it's not the way I want to teach. I try to be positive all the time.”
Stacey's original plan, after graduating from Georgia in 1987, was to teach for a summer in Oconee County and then move on to Atlanta. Just as she has done at Bishop Park, Stacey aggressively promoted the Oconee program, putting up signs on telephone poles and running ads in newspapers. It was during that first year that Stacey decided she might stick around the area for a little longer.
“It sounds really hokey, but there I was, out in the middle of Oconee County surrounded by cows and beautiful sunsets teaching tennis,” Stacey says. “I had a job hitting tennis balls and watching unbelievable sunsets. What could be better?”
Stacey, the one always on the go, decided to stay. She gave herself five years at Bishop Park; that milestone passed two years ago.
“I decided five years wasn't long enough,” Stacey says. “After that time was up, I got really depressed. I realized I liked Athens a lot and didn't want to move on. I've decided I'll be here as long as I enjoy it; there's no time limit. I don't think I'd want to do this anywhere else but in Athens.”
Moving to Atlanta in no longer a goal for Stacey. Instead, she has set her sights on a new achievement, making Bishop Park one of the best public tennis facilities not only in the Athens area, but in all of Northeast Georgia as well.
Bishop Park has been steadily moving in that direction. The park took a giant leap when three indoor courts, planned for construction next year, were approved as one of the projects when the special local option sales tax (SPLOST) passed in 1994.
“Having indoor courts is going to open a new world for us,” Stacey says excitedly. “It's not only going to allow us to play and practice in the rain, but it's also going to allow us to bring in a lot more programs. We'd also like to bring in some sectional USTA junior and adult programs. I'd like to bring in an ex-UGA player to teach a camp and market it as a ‘Come Back to the Classic City Weekend.' I'd like to have some special events, too, like a wheelchair tennis tournament. The only problem with all of this is that it would mean less time on the court for me.”
However, it would be hard to imagine a court without Stacey on it. “I was just telling someone the other day about all of the things we can do here,” Stacey says. “I can't remember a time when I was as excited as I am about teaching right now. I think we can take this program to another level.”
Lya Wodraska is? a sports writer for the Athens Daily News/ Athens Banner-Herald.