Still the king: Vero senior tennis player leads U.S. team to world championship

Tennis champion, again, at age 85 - King Van Nostrand. [Photo: Kaila Jones]

At age 85, Vero Beach’s tennis legend proved again last month that he’s still the king of the court.

Dominating his opponents in the 85-and-over division in the team, singles and doubles competitions at the International Tennis Federation Super Senior World Championships in Croatia, Grand Harbor resident King Van Nostrand added three more gold medals to an already impressive collection.

Van Nostrand now has won 41 age-group world championships – 19 as the leader of the United States team, 12 in singles and nine in doubles. Through the years, he also has won more than 60 U.S. national championships.

“We were way too strong,” Van Nostrand said of the Americans in the team event, held Sept. 15-21, when he led the U.S. to victories over Germany, Great Britain, Australia and Sweden to win the championship. “I played No. 1 singles, and I lost only three games in four matches.”

The Americans, in fact, did not lose a set, playing in a format in which each team match consisted of two lines of singles and one line of doubles.

In the singles and doubles tournaments, held Sept. 21-28, Van Nostrand lost only nine games in four singles matches, despite being the No. 2 seed in a 32-player draw. He defeated top-seeded Henri Cruchet – a former Davis Cup player for France – in the final.

Van Nostrand also teamed with 87-year-old John Powless of Madison, Wis., to win the doubles title.

“I’m at the young end of our age group, and I can run better than most guys,” said Van Nostrand, a former school teacher who moved to Vero Beach from Brightwaters, N.Y., in 2001 and has never lost a tournament match in Florida. “Having had my knees replaced (twice) is a huge advantage because I can run pain-free.”

Still, Van Nostrand went to Europe with an iffy hamstring that he first injured 18 months ago. Even after winning the men’s 85-and-over title at the U.S. Grass Court Championships in late August at the Longwood Cricket Club outside Boston, he didn’t know if it would hold up for two weeks on Umag’s red clay.

“Turns out, it didn’t bother me at all,” he said.

Which was a relief: The world championships were streamed live on the internet, and Van Nostrand knew he had family and friends watching back in the U.S., especially in Vero Beach.

“It sounds like a cliché, but it always means more when you play for your country and with teammates,” he said. “And when you get to my age, you don’t know how many more chances you’ll get.”

The super senior world championships featured men’s and women’s competition from the 65-and-over divisions through the 85-and-over divisions in five-year intervals.

“There’s no 90-and-over yet,” Van Nostrand said, “but I’m hoping.”

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