Meet the Tennis Center Staff: April Miller Lopez
August 9, 2022
Prospect Park’s courts require a labor of love to stay in their excellent condition, and April Miller Lopez, Prospect Park Tennis Center’s Senior Facility Maintainer is who makes it happen. With over five years experience at the Tennis Center, April has overseen and taken on a wide range of duties to keep the courts rally-ready at all times of year.
For one hour a day in the summer, April waters each of the center’s nine clay courts meticulously to protect the surface in extreme summer temperatures. “Outdoor season is my favorite season,” says April, “I love having that hour to focus solely on the courts and zone in to what needs to be done. The watering is like my ‘me-time’.” In the indoor season, when the courts cannot close for even an hour during the hours of operation, when play is nonstop, court repairs, watering and rolling happen after hours.
Adrian Clarke, the Tennis Center’s Director, explains: “These are high-maintenance courts, and April is the force that keeps our courts so pristine.”
Over the past two springs, the Tennis Center has contracted with a company called Oval Tennis to provide tips and training on how to best maintain our clay courts, and over those two years April and her team have gained a tremendous amount of knowledge which they have poured into caring for the courts. With this new knowledge and advancement, the Tennis Center team no longer has to “patch” the courts when damaged, but instead can repair entire areas when needed, which is a prominent area of April’s work. “It makes a difference to our players. The community has made it known that they can tell that our quality of care for the courts is always improving, which is what it’s all about. People are constantly praising the courts now and that’s a testament to April’s work.”
On what’s to come in the future of the Tennis Center, April says she is looking forward to seeing how things continue to change over the next seasons, “With the upcoming permanent fabric fixtures, I’m excited to see the shift for how the courts will work in the future–it will feel different than what we’re used to, with the bubble we have now. It’ll be the end of an era, but we’re looking forward to the future and continuing to provide a high quality experience to our players”.
