Sport: A Champion Steps Down

Pierre Etchebaster was a court tennis champion when Bill Tilden reigned as lawn tennis champion, when Bobby Jones was scoring his grand slam in golf, when Gene Tunney and Jack Dempsey were fighting for the heavyweight crown, and when Babe Ruth was slamming homers for the Yankees. Today, all the other heroes of the Golden Age of Sport are long since retired, and many are dead. Little (5 ft. 6 in., 150 Ibs.) Pierre Etchebaster is not only very much alive; he is still the champion of one of the most intricate, endurance-demanding games in the world. Last week, with no one on the limited (about 2,000 players) court tennis horizon to challenge him for the title, Pierre, 60, a grandfather and for the past 25 years the pro at New York's Racquet and Tennis Club, decided it was time to retire from competition.

Pierre, a Basque from St.-Jean-de-Luz, never held a court tennis racquet in his hand until he was 29. But by that time he had already served as a machine-gunner in the French army, was the French champion at the Basque games of chistera (jai alai), pala (jai alai with a small bat), and mains nues (handball). Within a year of taking up the 700-year-old game of court tennis, Pierre was champion of France, and five years later, in 1928, he was champion of the world.

Since then, though many have challenged, no one has managed to come close to beating the cat-quick little man who can hit the heavy cloth-covered ball with devastating power as well as delicate finesse. Pierre wants to quit while he is ahead: "It is a matter of prestige, you understand. It is for the record. It is for 26 years." Will he ever play competitively again? Pierre smiles. "I will perhaps play an exhibition with the new champion . . . Maybe two or three years from now."