Jack Fitzpatrick

Jack Fitzpatrick

The Peter R. Lyman award is now 30 years old. In the mid seventies the award was initiated by two of his former players, Dave and Richie Perlman, and who played for him and Spike Gonzales a long time player at Midtown Athletic Club. Peter coached both of the Perlman brothers at UR in both squash and tennis between 1964 and 1970, and they were the captains of his teams. These three players wanted to recognize individuals who, over several years, had demonstrated three qualities:

1. Exemplary sportsmanship on and off the court
2.Dedication to improving his or her own game
3.Significant contribution to the organization and development of squash in the Rochester area.

Our Lyman Sportsmanship awardee this year is one of the most recognizable and exemplary personalities on the Rochester Squash Scene. He is always a strong member of the city league and represents himself very well in our local tournaments, more often then not winning his bracket.
Over the years, this years’ recipient, has been heavily involved in promoting the game of squash, not only at his home Genesee Valley Club, but also throughout the community.
He has been on the board of Squash Rochester both as a club rep and currently as the Boards’ Vice President. He has been heavilly involved in promoting the game of squash to juniors, having been instrumental in bringing the US National Junior team to Rochester to train last summer, and is always a key member of the organizing committee for the annual George Armstrong Tournament held every fall.

During the past two summers, he has spearheaded opening up the Genesee Valleys Doubles court to all Squash Rochester members so that we may beat ourselves silly trying to learn the game and gear up for the Armstrong tournament in the fall. I sincerely hope that he continues this in coming years.

Please give a warm round of applause for the 2009 Peter Lyman award recipient – Jack Fitzpatrick!!!!

I am happy to present the Fred and Carol Weymuller Award. This award goes to the junior members who has distinguished him or herself with tournament play, has a national ranking, has shown disciplined and sound academics, and intends to continue to develop the game.

As you probably know, Fred and Carol were inducted to the US Squash Hall of fame in 2008, I happen to have the magazine here, and started the GVC Junior program ,from which this year’s honorees came, in the early 80s. And Kate Guyer is carrying on on that program.
It gives me great pleasure to announce this year’s joint recipients, Eliza Calihan and Alex Greaves-Tunnell!

Both have been US Scholar Athletes for the past four years, which means they have played in four tournaments and have maintained a 3.5 GPA or higher (See 2007, 2008 US Squash Scholar Athlete announcements). Eliza has been accepted at Harvard, and Alex is going to Williams.
I would also like to recognize their parents support, that is Peter and Louise Greaves-Tunnell and Rob and Nana Calihan.
Unfortunately Eliza could not be here today, please join me in congratulating both of them. Well done!

Excerpt about the Weymullers from the book Squash: A History of the Game By James Zug:

“…In 1965, The Heights Casino started its junior program when Fred Weyuller resigned his membership to become a tennis professional at the club. Weymuller, a Heights native who had worked at the Wall Street Journal, soon shuttled kids to squash courts because his junior tennis program was oversubscribed. In 1970 he brought his soon-to-be wife Carol into the club, and the young couple started a Sunday afternoon squash league and, in 1974, a morning junior program. In just six years, they produced an amazing generation: Bobby Ankerson, the Boyums, the Claytons, the Deans, the Franks, the MacKays, the McCarthys, the McConnells, Eric Vlcek and Erik Wohlgemuth. In 1977 Heights became the first club to send a group program to the nationals. At the same time, the Weymullers, Geff Fisher and Barbara Stewart persuaded Warren Smith, the president of the USSRA to create a standing junior committee. In 1978 the Weymullers started the first summer junior squash camp….”

US Squash officially announced the 2007 US Squash Scholar-Athlete Awards, given to high school student athletes who achieved a GPA of 3.5 or better and earned an end of the season squash ranking by competing in at least four sanctioned tournaments. This year’s 78 award recipients consist of student-athletes who attended public, private or boarding school in 13 states. These scholar-athletes reflect a wide range of squash levels as demonstrated by season ending rankings ranging from #1 to #89. Vijay Chitnis, Director of National Teams, Events and Junior Squash stated, “It is quite an achievement to be designated an outstanding athlete in this sport and an outstanding high school student in the classroom.”

Read more at US Squash…

This was followed by the presentation of the Weymuller Award for Most Outstanding Junior to Alden Irwin.

The final award of the night – the Peter Lyman Award for Sportsmanship was presented to Hugh Higgins.

After indulging in some delicious hors douevres and drinks, the crowd settled down to watch a screening of the Oscar nominated short film “Squash” by French director Lionel Bailliu.
A great time was had by all…so until next year!

Congratulations once again to all our winners!

The Peter R. Lyman award is now close to 30 years old. In the mid seventies the award was initiated by two of his former players, Dave and Richie Perlman, and who played for him and Spike Gonzales a long time player here at Midtown. Peter coached both of the Perlman brothers at UR in both squash and tennis between 1964 and 1970, and they were the captains of his teams.

These three players wanted to recognize individuals who, over several years, had demonstrated three qualities:

1. Exemplary sportsmanship on and off the court
2.Dedication to improving his or her own game
3.Significant contribution to the organization and development of squash in the Rochester area.

Our Lyman awardee this year is one of the friendliest faces on the Med Center squash courts – we’re all a friendly bunch actually .

Over the years he has steadily developed his game climbed up the ladder and now plays in Box 1 of the Med Center club ladder. Part of the credit should go to his state of the art squash equipment – be it the latest line of racquets, eyewear, shoes or DVDs – he has it!! At the same time, he will readily share his stuff – I know I have borrowed his brand new expensive racquet more than once.

He is also a keen student of the game and consciously studies to develop it through lessons and video. He has been a membership chair on the RSRA Board for the past few years and helps organize local tournaments, including the recent city tournament in January.

Very recently, in February this year, he and another previous Lyman awardee, Eric Hernady represented the United States at the prestigious Lapham Grant, a 15 man head-to-head amateur tournament between the US and Canada in Toronto.

Please give a warm round of applause for the 2007 Peter Lyman award recipient….HUGH HIGGINS!!!!

These three players wanted to recognize individuals who, over several years, had demonstrated three qualities:
* Sportsmanship on the court and off,
* Dedication to improving his or her own game, and
* A significant contribution to the organization and development of squash in the Rochester area.

The many past winners of this award have done so much for squash here in Rochester. Fred Weymuller, Eric Hernady, Rishad Pandole, Don Andrews, Chip Nimick, Paul Brogna, Herb Barbehenn and many others. Last year I was honored to be included in this company.

This year’s Peter Lyman winner personifies this tradition of sportsmanship, improvement, and contribution. In fact, if we were to add a criterion of enthusiasm for the sport, then this award would have to be renamed in his honor instead being called the Lyman award.

He is relatively new to the squash community here in Rochester, but has been involved at every level that he could be right from the very beginning. He arrived in Rochester around the same time as our first pro tournament and he immediately began volunteering for everything that he could to help make the first Rochester Pro Tournament a complete success.

I first got a taste of this unbridled enthusiasm at this same time when I got an email from our honoree saying that he wanted to join our Med Center box league. Well, I signed him up and he started playing. It was only after several weeks that I discovered out that he was not affiliated with the UR in any way and was not even eligible to be a member of our club!!! Somehow he kept finding ways to get in touch with his opponents and getting into the club as a guest to get his matches played. I regretted that I had to contact him and tell him that he could no longer be a part of our Med Center community. Luckily for us, he later got a job at the University and is now one of the most ubiquitous figures around our courts.

It wasn’t long after that that he joined the board and has been active citywide and region-wide in promoting squash however he can. He helps organize tournaments, he participates in tournaments, he writes about and photographs tournaments and any other squash activity.

In a way I feel that I am sandwiched between two Lyman winners who represent the changing technology of these times. Last year’s honoree, Lisa Slater, was the editor-in-chief of the last of the printed Boast, our RSRA newsletter. This year’s honoree has taken the Boast and transformed it into the new world of electronic media and is one of the driving forces behind SquashRochester.org.

He hails from the town of Pune, India, about three hours south of Bombay. India has a rich tradition of squash over these past many decades and has contributed much to the realm of squash all over the world. Our honoree this year brings that history of squash with him as he has come to Rochester to join us and to bring his many talents and his unbridled enthusiasm here to our community.

Please join me in welcoming the 2006 Peter Lyman Award winner, Mithun Mukherjee.

Back in 2001, our honoree had recently left another very active and competitive sport, having achieved top 20 North American honors and having been a founding member of the first US national competition in one version of the sport [women’s sabre fencing], a version that will be introduced to the Olympics for the first time this August.

Back then, our honoree was looking to become active in a new sport and was seeking a sport with several qualities – an interactive sport, one that rewards both mental and physical involvement, that invites a high level of fitness, that keeps participants playing from childhood to well past retirement age, and perhaps most important, a sport with a great sense of community. Our honoree chose squash racquets, and we all here are much the better for it.

Starting dead last on the Rochester Squash Ladder, which was around number 250 at the time, our honoree has developed her game and has lately achieved a ranking of 116 on a ladder that has grown to 300. Looking to play the game correctly from the start, she has participated in a refereeing clinic taught by Penny Glover and a weekend squash clinic training taught by Mike Way. On the competitive side, she participates not only in our interclub team play, representing the UR/Zornow club in Division III, but also is frequently seen in local tournament draws.

Our honoree has been particularly active in bring more women players to our sport. She has spent many, many evenings enthusiastically working to get the female students at the University into the game of squash. With former UR coach Chris O’Brien, she helped to coach and chaperone the first University of Rochester women’s squash team ever to participate in the intercollegiate championship tournament.

Our honoree has been on the Board of the Rochester Squash Racquets Association for a number of years in several capacities.

As Club Rep for Kodak Park, she has been instrumental in expanding the club ladder, in keeping the club active in city league play, and even in keeping the courts maintained.

As the current editor of our newsletter, the Boast, she not only seeks out or writes the stories, but she also goes to the event sites to take pictures for our publication. She has been observed, camera and notepad in hand, as far afield as the YMG Canadian Classic in Toronto. Our publication is first rate thanks to her considerable efforts.

Our honoree is a consistent contributor to the Board, both at regular meetings and by frequent e-mail (in fact, some of us have wondered whether Kodak has granted her a leave to guide Rochester squash), and she is not afraid to ask the tough questions on the many issues that the Board must address.

A good indication of our honoree’s commitment to squash, and to holding this event here tonight in appreciation of the achievments of Rochester’s squash players, is her presence with us. It seems that her wide ranging interest in sport would otherwise have placed her in New York City this very weekend, where she would love to be riding her bicycle in the “Great Five Boro Tour”.

I’m sure you would all agree, our honoree is a dedicated supporter of squash who has had a much appreciated impact on the game in Rochester. Please join me in congratulating our most worthy 2004 recipient of the Peter R. Lyman Award, Lisa Slater.

This award honors the top junior in the Rochester squash community (Rochester Squash Racquets Association), who distinguishes himself or herself by tournament play and national ranking, who demonstrates discipline by maintaining a sound academic standing while pursuing the game, and who intends to continue to develop his or her game over the years to come." This year’s honoree has displayed steady improvement throughout his 10-year junior career. His Rochester squash career ranges from a beginning player from the vast stable of junior players coached by Fred Weymuller to an accomplished tournament player at the local, state and national levels.

This year’s honoree is a soon-to-be graduate of Pittsford Sutherland High School with many of his studies focused on math, economics, business and communications. He is firmly grounded by his convictions, hard work, and perseverance. A Boy Scout now for 16 years, he earned the highest level in scouting, Eagle Scout, and now mentors younger boy scouts in and around Rochester.

Like many high school age students he spends some of his time throughout the year working to earn money for the many hiking and backpacking outings he and his brother take together. During this past year’s PGA Championship at Oak Hill he netted several thousand dollars parking cars! He and his brother are currently entered in a nation-wide entrepreneurship contest. They plan to coordinate ATM machines from New England to California into a variation on the "Ticketron" theme and sell tickets to all types of entertainment events. They will essentially take your money before you get it in your hands! Recently, he was accepted to attend the University of Southern California in their engineering school with a minor in entrepreneurship (gee, what a stretch?!) and the University of Maryland at College Park. His final decision is yet to come (he is leaning toward CA), but it seems like he is in a win-win situation.

My first encounter with our honoree was when he attempted to start a squash club at his high school. He made several efforts but things did not work out. Clearly he was onto something integral to the future of our squash community that may some day come to fruition and we will look back and owe a small bit gratitude for his creativity and initiative. He has played squash for 10 years all in Rochester. He started at Rochester Squash and Fitness with Fred Weymuller and Rashad Pandole, and then played at the University of Rochester with squash coaches Chris O’Brien and David Kay. As his squash game matured he like other top junior players in Rochester played under the tutelage of Mark Sachvie in St. Catherine’s, Ontario while at the same time taking advantage of the vast squash experience of Kate Whitmore at the Genesee Valley Club.

Our honoree has played 8 years of competitive tournament squash. He has traveled to tournaments at the state and national levels. Locally he is considered to be the top player in his age group and this year was the third-place finisher in the Ward-Riley Championships, as well as the champion of both the Buffalo and Dayton Juniors tournaments. He plans to continue playing squash in the local clubs and leagues, and knowing his proven determination this is not a hollow promise. Of course, I did advise him that I make annual pilgrimages to California and will be checking in with racquet in hand!

Without further adieu please give a well-deserved congratulations to the winner of the 2004 Weymuller Award…Tyler Kurlas.