Atwell reflects on 16 years at the helm of Borderline Billiards
The Days Before . . .
As WPBA competitor Janet Atwell was hosting what would become the final tournament event at her (current) Borderline Billiards facility in Bristol, TN this past weekend (Jan. 27-28), a stop on the Premierbilliards.com’s Q City 9-Ball Tour, she had occasion to look back and recall the day that the room opened, 18 years ago in March of 2006. It was not, strictly speaking, Atwell’s ‘first rodeo,’ but the opening came under a bit of time pressure associated with its location.
“I had a couple of smaller rooms beforehand,” she said, “but it was my first room of any magnitude, and a big undertaking for sure. Looking back at it, I know that we rushed and rushed all that last month because of NASCAR in Bristol.”
“Our goal was to get open for the March race,” she added. “We met the deadline and when we first opened, we had an immediate influx of people downtown because of NASCAR. We opened the doors without any kind of soft opening, just opened right up to ‘event time’ and it sort of grew from there.”
Not right away, of course. The elapsed time between the opening of the doors and the steady growth that led to Borderline Billiards’ success over the years took a lot of personal effort and time. And in the beginning, Atwell spent some of that time questioning whether or not it was, in fact, going to be successful.
“For one thing,” she said, “I was just praying that there was enough of a pool-playing customer base to sustain a business of that magnitude.”
In addition to just opening the doors, Atwell was initiating a number of nuances to the area’s pool scene. Untried and arguably, at the time, questionable innovations which proved successful and helped the room prosper and grow.
“It was the only room within a 35-40 minute radius with alcohol,” she said, “so that and a full food menu was going to be a draw for me that other pool rooms didn’t have.”
“It was the first room back then to go non-smoking, too,” she added. “I was trying to change the persona of the smoke-filled room, to make it more of a family atmosphere; well-lit and designed to appeal to all ages.”
“And then, of course, it was a matter of getting accustomed to alcohol sales, alcohol and food laws and having to synchronize everything, which required a lot of multi-tasking. And being a registered nurse meant I was working during the day and coming to that at night.”
Niko Konkel and Janet Atwell
The Days Of . . .
Fast-forward 16 years to this past weekend and the last event, which drew 54 entrants, many of whom travelled varied long distances to be there. It would have been ‘storybook’ nice for Atwell to have played a major role in how it turned out; among the final few or, even better, to have won. But, and Atwell would have expected nothing less, that ‘storybook’ plot ended when things started up at the tables. She battled to double-hill in her opening match, but was sent to the loss side. Three matches later, she locked up in a second, double-hill battle that she lost, which, from her perspective, was just as well. By her own admission, her head wasn’t really ‘in the game.’
“I thought about not even getting into the tournament,” she said. “I got very involved taking pictures and on Sunday, we started tearing down the tables, at 10 a.m., while the tournament was still going on. It was hard to focus. The day was (about) lots of different emotions and I was excited to see everybody. I was super-pleased, because it was 54 people that I’d played with a lot over the years.”
“It was nice to have the energy that was in the room,” she added. “That first round, I drew (junior competitor) Eddie Vondereau’s Dad (Pete) and it was super nice, a very relaxed atmosphere, but I would rather have been talking to people than playing. I was just excited to see everybody.”
“Both (of my lost) matches did go double-hill (to include her third-round, loss-side match to Tristan Denny) but it just wasn’t my primary focus.”
It was Scott Roberts who went undefeated to the hot seat. He and Landon Hollingsworth opted out of playing a final match and negotiated a split of the top two cash prizes, leaving Roberts, as the hot seat occupant at the time, as the event’s official winner.
Roberts, racing to 8 throughout, got by (junior competitor) Jas Makhani 8-5 in the opening round of play. None of Roberts’ remaining five opponents chalked up as many racks against him.
Still reflecting on the emotions of the day, Atwell noted that while it was the end of an era for everybody, it was particularly emotional for a large group of junior competitors like Makhani, whom she’d encouraged and mentored over the years; players like Landon Hollingsworth, Hayleigh Marion, Eddie Vondereau, Hayleigh Marion and Niko Konkel (whom Atwell defeated in the opening round of her loss-side matches). All in attendance, along with others who didn’t make it to Bristol for the last event. In a way, she went on to explain, while she herself had ‘grown up’ a lot through her years at Borderline Billiards, for the junior players in attendance, it was a site where these young competitors had literally grown up.
“It was sad for them, too,” she said, “They were leaving a part of their childhood behind.”
Roberts advanced, past Danny Clay (4), Dusty Wallace (0) and Kaleb Hixon (2), to arrive at a winners’ side semifinal match against Robert McCoy. Hollingsworth in the meantime (racing to 9), sent Cliff Stout (2), Michael Bramlett (2), Brian Anderson (3) and Ron Frank (4) to the loss side and drew Robert Ingold in the other winners’ side semifinal.
Roberts shut out McCoy, advancing to the hot seat match. Hollingsworth joined him after sending Ingold over 9-2. Roberts played what proved to be his last match and defeated Hollingsworth 8-4 to claim the hot seat.
On the loss side, Ingold picked up Rudy Hess, who’d lost his opening match to Travis Guerra 5-2 and embarked on a eight-match, loss-side winning streak that would take him as far as a rematch vs. Guerra in the quarterfinals. Hess had recently eliminated Scott Largen, double hill and Daniel Lewis 5-3. McCoy drew Guerra, who’d followed his winners’ side quarterfinal loss to Ingold with two straight, double-hill wins over Pete Vondereau and Ron Frank.
Guerra shut McCoy out and advanced to the quarterfinals. Hess joined him for their rematch after eliminating Ingold 5-1. Guerra defeated Hess 5-3, putting a stop to the weekend’s longest loss-side run (and most matches by any competitor), and then, had his own four-match journey on the loss side ended by Hollingsworth in the semifinals 9-4.
It was early evening on Sunday, when Roberts and Hollingsworth opted out a final match and negotiated their split of the top two prizes, as pool tables were being de-constructed around them.
Q City 9-Ball Tour Director, Herman Parker thanked Janet Atwell for hosting the event, as Atwell thanked him for drawing its 54 entrants to the location’s final, farewell tournament. Parker also thanked title sponsor PremierBilliards.com, BarPoolTables.net (Randy Tate), TKO Custom Cues and Realty One Group results (Kirk Overcash), Dirty South Grind Apparel (Angela Harlan-Parker), Federal Savings Bank (Alex Narod), CHC Underground (Chris Clary) and AZBilliards. This coming weekend (Feb. 3-4), PremierBilliards.com’s TOP (The Open Player) Tour will bring the 2nd Annual Winter Classic to Dot’s Cue Club in Rocky Mount, NC.
The Days To Come . . .
Janet Atwell speculates that the ‘new’ Borderline Billiards will have its ‘soft opening’ on March 1st, although she’d be unlikely to pick it in a Calcutta of potential dates; too many unpredictable events will have to occur for it to happen, many such events dependent on a kind of ‘domino’ series of other events that have to precede each other; tiles before plumbing, for example, and ‘green lights’ to multiple contractors (tile guys to plumbing guys) to move forward.
“Not everything is synchronized,” she explained, “though a lot is going to transpire over the next two weeks.”
“Today was a big day,” she said on Monday (Jan. 29). “They took the front off the (new) building.”
She has a tentative date set (May 8-12) for the WPBA’s first visit to the room for the 1st Borderline Brunswick Invitational. The WPBA Web site has the event listed for those dates, but includes the information that the $20,000-added event is “Tentative on Grand Opening” with a final decision to be made in the middle of next month.
Atwell herself appears to be somewhere between “there’s so much to do” and “the opening can’t come soon enough.” She is clear on a few things.
“I’m looking forward to it,” she said. “It’s beautiful, for one thing. The Arena has two floors and is laid out to accommodate players and spectators for viewing.”
While her affiliation with pool may define the room, Atwell is already making plans to incorporate other activities, expanding on the range of sports enthusiasts who’ll be calling the new place their home.
“I have a Foosball pro ‘on board’ for a league,” she said, “and a huge dart area for leagues, too. It’s an opportunity to grow darts and pool. A mixture of sports enthusiasts will improve the ambiance and being diversified like that, the crowds should show some cross-interest with the sports.”
One thing that will remain the same is the new room’s relative location, a “few doors down” from the old location. Regular patrons are not likely to get lost in the matter of minutes that it might take to walk from the ‘old’ to the ‘new.’
“One of the biggest things about the new building,” she said, “is the fact that I get to stay downtown (in Bristol, TN) and continue to be part of my downtown family. The biggest and best news from a pool perspective is picking up Brunswick and redesigning the room to become the premier Brunswick arena, which they hope to use as a model across the US to get Brunswick back in the game.”
“All the tables in the new building are going to Brunswick tables,” she added. “Gold Crown 6’s for the opening and as soon as the Gold Crown 7’s come out, I’ll go to that.”
Beyond looking forward to the opening, Atwell is also looking forward to a stabilizing relationship with the facility’s owner. That would be Atwell herself.
“I’m looking forward to not worrying about rent increases,” she said, “continuing to build what I have and know that it’s mine and not about upgrading someone else’s property.”
Stay tuned. The new Borderline Billiards, Home of the Premier Brunswick Arena, is on its way.
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