Month: August 2024

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2024 22nd Worlds Bracket Event Recap

De La Rosa wins his first World singles title, gets the double with a Mixed title. Photo via IRF

The 22nd @International Racquetball Federation – IRF World Championships bracket events are in the books. Here’s a recap of the knockout stage action, along with links for the results as entered into the Pro Racquetball Stats database.

Congratulations to the winners:

– Men’s Singles: Daniel De La Rosa , USA

– Women’s Singles: Paola Longoria , Mexico

– Men’s Doubles: Samuel Murray & @Coby Iwaasa , Canada

– Women’s Doubles: @Alexandra Herrera & Montse Mejia, Mexico

– Mixed Doubles: Daniel De la Rosa & Hollie Scott , USA

Executive Summary: Great week for DLR, who goes undefeated and wins both Singles and Mixed. One has to wonder what would have happened if he had chosen to play Men’s doubles with his USA national championship winning partner Fernandez. Team Mexico does the double, winning both Women’s Singles and Doubles. Canada’s men’s doubles team continues to get results, making their 5th international final since 2019 and getting their second title. Bolivia is completely shut out after several cycles of multiple-win performances.

r2sports home page: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=42436

Pro Racquetball Stats DB match results. Click on these links to see the match results for this event in the DB:

– Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/8gq

– Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/iby

– Men’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/v19

– Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/2l0

– Mixed Doubles: https://rball.pro/2gk

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For the rest of the event, they will play a “Team competition” davis-cup style where countries play singles and doubles as a team to advance; we’ll cover this and its World Games qualification import in an other post. Meanwhile, for decades all the individual play has historically resulted in separate “Team Standings” for IRF events. I’m not sure, with the advent of the team play recently, if IRF even maintains the Team Points results anymore … but we do for historical purposes. So…

Team Points Results From Knockouts

The “Team Standings” were determined by a standard algorithm that awarded points based on group stage and knockout performance.

(You can get these “team results” via queries available from the IRF singles page off of proracquetballstats.com historical site)

Combined Team (Overall)

1st – Mexico

2nd – USA

3rd – Bolivia

4th — Argentina

Mexico had the combined win sealed up even before any of the finals were played on thursday on the strength of their Women’s results. Bolivia edged Argentina for 3rd place by just four points, which is kind of ironic considering that Argentina’s entire team (Centellas, Garcia, Mendez, Miranda, and Vargas) all were born in Bolivia and switched allegiances to their South American Neighbor.

Men’s Team

1st – USA

2nd – Mexico

3rd – Bolivia

4th – Canada

USA’s dual-singles finals and Mexico’s early knockouts seal the Men’s title for USA.

Women’s Team

1st – Mexico

2nd – Argentina

3rd – Guatemala

4th – USA

Mexico nearly took maximum possible points for women, with 3 group stage wins and the singles title.

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Let’s run through the individual draws and talk about notable results.

Men’s Singles:

The Men’s singles knockout round went about as expected until the quarters … then all hell broke loose. I missed on 3 of the 4 quarter results in my prediction piece, headlined by the shock loss of the top seed and current IRT #1 Moscoso to Mexico’s #2 Portillo. USA’s #2 @Jake Bredenbeck had to go five to topple Argentina’s Garcia, and the infrequent touring pro Bolivian Carlos Keller Vargas took out Mexico’s Andree Parrilla. In the semis, Jake took out Lalo to get to the finals of an international competition the first time since 2016. There he met De La Rosa, who cruised past Keller in the other semi.

It was the first all-american final in an IRF event since 2015, and the first all-USA final in an IRF Major since 2010. Ironically, the last time Jake made an IRF singles final, his opponent was … De la Rosa as well. In the final, DLR ground out two game wins, then Jake caught fire and nearly donuted Daniel in the third before he caught fire in the fourth and pasted Jake 11-4 to claim the title. It’s Daniel’s first ever World title.

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Women’s Singles:

The GOAT cruised into the final, topping the young Bolivian Rivero in the, then the hobbled Vargas in the semis. Meanwhile Guatemala’s Martinez beat USA’s Key in the opener, then beat former LPRT tour champ Mejia in the quarters in a match that included the single longest game (23-21) in IRF history, then she came from a game down to topple Chile’s Carla Munoz in the semis.

Longoria and @Ana Gabriela Martínez met in the Worlds final for the fourth time in the last five World Championships, and Longoria came out on top in the final to claim her 6th IRF World title. It’s also her 26th career IRF singles title, with wins dating all the way back to 2006.

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Men’s Doubles.

The #1 doubles team in the world (Montoya & Mar) was upset in Mexican Nationals this year by the #1 seed here (Parrilla & Portillo): they cruised into the title game with a 4-game win over team USA (Manilla & Fernandez) that wasn’t without a bit of controversy late. Meanwhile, Team Canada (Murray & Iwaasa), who have a habit of making it to the gold medal match internationally (they now have made 6 gold medal Men’s Pro Doubles matches since 2019), ground out two tough 5 game wins, including over Bolivia in the semis to ensure a medal-less event for the racquetball-rabid country, to get to the finals again.

In the final, Team Canada won a back and forth 5 game match where the momentum switched over and again.

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Women’s Doubles:

They had to work for it, but the dominant #1 pro doubles team of Mejia & Herrera came from behind in the 5th to win the five-game thriller over team Argentina (Vargas & Mendez) to claim the title. Its their third IRF title in the last two years.

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Mixed Doubles

Team USA’s De La Rosa would not be denied in San Antonio, as he took over for stretches to take the mixed title with partner Hollie Scott.

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Congrats to the International Racquetball Federation for another successful event. Thanks to the IRT streaming crew, and thanks to @Gary Mazaroff and Gustavo and all his co-announcers for their hard work all week.

Next up on the Racquetball Calendar: https://docs.google.com/…/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2…/edit…

We’ll cover the IRF team event next week in another post. Then next weekend 9/8/24 is world Racquetball day, with shootouts and tourneys all over the country. Please consider supporting your event organizers by playing in one of these events. One of the biggest will be an outdoor event at Stratton Woods park in Northern Virginia with a lot of traveling talent for the Bolivian Open.

After that, we have the 3WallBall event with the introduction of World Team Racquetball in Las Vegas at the end of September.

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IRT 2024 Worlds Group Stage recap and Knockout Preview

Longoria is the ladies favorite heading into the knockouts Photo via US Open 2019, Kevin Savory

The matches come fast and furious at the 22nd annual International Racquetball Federation – IRF World Championships. The Round Robins finished late on 8/26/24 and the knockouts start first thing 8/27/24 morning.

The round robins “eliminated” the lowest finishers in each RR group, who drop to a consolation bracket of sorts while the top 2 from each group comprise the winner’s bracket/single elimination knockouts going forward. This ended up eliminating a few surprise players/teams, but for the most part the RRs went according to seeds across the board.

Quick observations from the group stage:

– In Men’s singles, just one upset of a top seed when Diego Garcia upset Costa Rica’s @Andres Acuna . Garcia grabs the #5 seed while Acuna drops to #14 seed and a very tough hill to climb to get back to the semis or finals. Probably the other biggest shock was India’s Vineet Singh grabbing the 2nd seed out of group 8 to claim a knockout spot in the top group. The biggest names to fall into the consolation bracket probably were Chile’s Johan Igor or perhaps South Korea’s Namwoo Lee, but otherwise the Men’s singles was pretty chalky.

– In Women’s Singles: @Carla Munoz upset USA’s @Kelani Lawrence , the #2 overall seed, in a solid international upset. @Angelica Barrios – Raquetbolista took out USA’s @Michelle Key in another upset by seed, but clearly not by world ranking, to knock both of USA’s top players out of a top 8 seed in the knockouts. The biggest upsets in the group stage were Guatemala’s @MaMaria Renee Rodríguez getting knocked into the consolation bracket, as well as Canada’s @Danielle Ramsay and Ecuador’s @Maria Jose Munoz.

– In Men’s Doubles: no real surprises. There were a couple of team upsets by seed but not by talent. Chile’s Natera/Igor was in a group of death, and Guatemala’s Galicia/Salvatierra faced an uphill battle to qualify. Perhaps the biggest story line of the group stage here was several 5-game battles that the top seeds had to undertake to maintain their perfect record on Monday.

– In Women’s Doubles, the big shock was Guatemala’s former gold medal winning team of Martinez/Rodriguez getting taken out by Canada’s Lambert & Parent. Lambert plays only sparingly and Parent is still pretty new on the world stage, so to take out a top 4 touring pro in Gaby is huge. The DR’s up and coming team of Delgado & Cespedes falls to the consolation bracket out of the same group.

– In Mixed: Guatemala shocked Canada’s Murray/Lambert team to claim the #2 knockout seed. #1 overall seed mar/Mejia had to go 5 games to top Chile’s Munoz/Natera, and USA needed to come from 2 games down to “upset” Argentina’s Miranda/Centellas to claim the #4 seed in knockouts.

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Knockout Previews:

– Men’s Singles: Acuna/Keller is a tough opener for both and an upset watch. #10 Salvatierra can take out #7 Garcia in the only real upsets I see in the 32s or 16s. In the quarters, I can see Argentina’s Garcia taking out USA’s Bredenbeck (he rarely tours but when he does he gets results), while the bottom half’s seeds should move on easily. I see Moscoso topping Garcia in one semi, DLR taking out Parrilla in the other, and Moscoso beating a somewhat rusty DLR for the title.

– Women’s Singles: The quarters will be epic: Longoria-Rivero, Vargas-Barrios, Mejia-Gaby, and Munoz-Mendez, with a couple of LPRT-semis quality matchups. I’m thinking that it turns out to be Longoria-Vargas in the top semi, the one player Longoria really didn’t want to see until the final. Vargas looked a bit off at the LPRT season opener, nursing an injury according to my sources, so It wouldn’t surprise me if she falls to the grinder Barrios or Longoria. Paola to the final from the top. From the bottom, whoever wins between Mejia-Gaby should advance to the final. Either way, its advantage Paola, who I think wins yet another world title.

– Men’s Doubles: Mexico’s Parrilla/Portillo probably isn’t even Mexico’s best doubles team, but they should get to the final over USA’s Manilla/Sebastian (who haven’t quite gelled as a team so far). From the bottom, I like Canada’s veteran team of Murray & Iwaasa to pick on Carrasco endlessly and move past Bolivia. In the final, Mexico wins.

– Women’s Doubles: Mejia and Herrera won 7 of the 8 LPRT doubles titles last year, and there’s no reason to think they won’t cruise to the title here.

– Mixed Doubles: the most unpredictable draw. I could see Mar/Mejia getting beat first round by Natera/Munoz, or I could see them winning it. Moscoso/Barrios versus Miranda/Centellas is an awesome opener. The top half is stacked, while the bottom half opens up really well for USA’s DLR/Scott, who should easily get to the final. But i think they’ll fall to whichever team advances from the top; i’ll guess Moscoso/Barrios.

Keep on watching on the IRF streams. Lots of fun action to come.

Ill be curious to see how they do the Team competition, which right now is stubbed out on r2 as just the top four. I’ve got the spreadsheet of typical IRF points calculations updated for the group stage for now; the expected teams are in the lead so far (Mexico, Bolivia, then USA though Argentina is right there).

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22nd IRF Worlds Event Preview

Moscoso always come to play at Worlds, and he’s the #1 seed this week. Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory

R2 site: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=42436

This weekend kicks off the 22nd ever World Championships, the pinnacle of international competition in our sport. The event is being held in San Antonio, at the Thousand Oaks Family YMCA, the same site that holds the LPRT’s Battle at the Alamo every year. By the time you read this, pool play will have kicked off.

This is the first time that the IRF has held its World Championships, or any major international competition, on USA soil since 1996, when the tournament was in Phoenix. It’s been nearly 30 years since either Worlds or the Pan American Racquetball Championships was held in the country of the sport’s origin, but we’re back now. USA Racquetball made the commitment earlier this year to host the tournament based partly on this argument; it has been way too long.

The competitors, who are coming from at least 16 different countries, will compete in singles, doubles, and mixed doubles for the next week. All the players will compete in round robin competitions for the first few days, which are seeded per the IRF’s seeding policy (country-based, not individual based, and driven by the results in IRF competitions over the last couple of major tournament cycles). Once RRs are done, the draws will be seeded fully and then we’ll do a single elimination knockout phase all next week, culminating with Saturday finals in all divisions.

We’ll post a knockout preview once those draws are set, with predictions.

For now, we see that there’s several top IRT and LPRT players here who are early favorites. In Men’s singles, Moscoso & DLR likely feed into the two top seeds on the men’s side. Current #2 Montoya didn’t qualify, leaving Parrilla and Portillo as the Mexican representatives and semis favorites. In Ladies singles, four of the top five ranked pros are here (Longoria, Mejia, Vargas, and Gaby), which means the eventual semis and some of the quarters even will be pro-final quality matches.

One thing fans will notice; unlike any pro event and unlike most other international events, this event will play some Olympic style draws (where the knockouts have sub draws) and there will be some sort of team competition (either as a team or based on the individual performances of country teammates). That’s because this tournament also will serve as the qualifier to the 2025 World Games, held in China.

We weren’t sure there would be racquetball at the Chengdu, China based World Games, but word came out recently that the country had committed to the event. Furthermore, they’ll be playing mixed doubles (not just singles as were played in Birmingham back in 2022). So, that means each country will qualify exactly one man and one woman (a change from 2022). Furthermore, instead of individuals qualifying based on their singles performances, a team competition to be held this week will determine the 16 countries who qualify in.

Then, the seeding at the 2025 WGs will go by individual performances here in San Antonio, but that’s a conversation for another day.

Lastly, the WG 2025 will be limited to 16 countries, with 4 saved for Asian countries (host China plus 3 others, likely to be South Korea, Japan and maybe India). There will also be 4 saved for European countries (the likely participants seem to be Ireland and Germany for sure, but two other European countries might be hard to come by. We’ve had reps from Spain, England, Ukraine, Catalonia in the past few cycles, but we’ll have to see who is here in SA.

The remaining 8 countries are for North and South Americans, but if Asia/Europe can’t field 4 teams there will be additional spots opened up. The favorite 8 American countries to qualify seem to be USA, Canada, Mexico, Bolivia, Argentina, Guatemala, Ecuador, and Chile. That would leave aspiring and frequent international teams like Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Honduras, and the Dominican Republic on the outside looking in unless a spot is freed up.

Qualification details are here: hopefully i’m interpreting this document correctly: https://www.internationalracquetball.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IRF-Qualification-TWG2025s.pdf

First things first though; round robins kick off on today 8/24/24 with streaming on IRF’s facebook channel.

@International Racquetball Federation – IRF

International Racquetball Tour

LPRT

@USA Racquetball

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Landa-Montoya Invitational 2024 Recap

Mar gets the double in Juarez last weekend. Photo via PK

Last weekend, there was as small non-sanctioned event in Juarez that featured a number of top Mexican players held in honor of the retiring Alejandro Landa and the current #2 @Rodrigo Montoya Racquetball Here’s a recap of the top divisions.

r2sports site: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=45146

The top six seeds are regulars on the pro tour. The 8/9 match was between two top Mexican juniors in Sebastian Hernandez (who just won Mexican 21U junior nationals) and @Eder Renteria (who made the finals of 16U Junior worlds last November and the semis of Mexican 18U last month). Hernandez handled Renteria as expected to face off against #1 Montoya.

In the quarters:

– Montoya needed to go breaker to take down the Mexican 21U champ Hernandez but moved on.

– Long-time top Mexican player @Javier Mar, who’s been bedeviled with injuries the last couple of years, taking out Guatemala’s #1 Juan Salvatierra

– #3 @Jaime Martell topped Guatemalan veteran Edwin Galicia in two.

– #2 Alan Natera topped Mexican open player Mario Zamora .

In the semis, an upset. Mar took out his long-time doubles partner Montoya in two relatively easy games 5,12, while Natera eased past Martell 11,2.

In the final, Mar continued his run and topped Natera 12,12 for the title.

Side note: Natera recently converted to represent Chile, eligible by virtue of his marriage to long-time Chilean representative Carla Munoz , and recently claimed the Chilean national title and secured a berth at Worlds in San Antonio later this month.

There was a 3-team doubles competition that came down to the two top seeds for the final. There, #1 Montoya/Mar topped Chihuahua-based team of Natera/Hernandez 9,(13),5.

Congrats Mar for the double on the weekend, and for Montoya for winning his namesake event.

ps: thanks to Natera for giving me the results … the r2 site never got the singles final nor the doubles knockouts updated online but Alan provided the data.

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New Report at Pro Racquetball Stats: Most Seasons for a player

While writing the content for this past weekend’s LPRT event, I made mention of the fact that @Susy Acosta was in the draw, and that this would be her 27th season with at least one appearance. I knew it was 27 because I counted the lines on my screen from her Season Summary report. However, I didn’t know whether that was a record or not because … i never have written a query or report to answer that question.

Now I have.

And the answer is … with this appearance, Acosta is now tied with Cheryl Gudinas for having played in 27 different pro seasons, the most all time on the LPRT.

Here’s that new query, available on the report selection page of the ProRacquetballStats.com page in the bottom/General section titled “Most Seasons.”

Here’s a link to the Women’s report: https://rball.pro/nqd

And here’s the link for the Men: https://rball.pro/uvo

(Before you click on the reports, try to guess the top 5 for each as a fun exercise).

The report will also work in other databases like Juniors, Amateurs, WOR, etc. So you could get a list of how many times a certain player has played their country’s nationals or international competitions (run the one for Amateur singles and all the players with the most seasons are Canadians).

Enjoy!

I’m always open to report suggestions by the way, if you think of something you’d like to see in racquetball match data.

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LPRT Mile High Open Recap

Gaby wins the season opener in an 11-10 thriller. Photo via Gaby

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Singles: Ana Gabriela Martínez

– Doubles: @Monserrat Mejia & Brenda Laime

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=42406

Martinez kicks off the new season with two notable results, her 3rd career LPRT win and her putting a very early loss on Vargas.

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Let’s review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/zcr

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In the 32s:

– Michelle Key looked solid downing Sheryl Lotts 10,8. Keep this result in mind when we talk about her round of 16 performance.

– @MariMaria Renee Rodríguez powered past @MMaria Paz Leal Riquelme 4,1 in her “return” to the tour.

-Valeria Centellas struggled in her first game back, but played better in a game 2 loss to @jessical Parrilla 3,12.

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In the 16s:

– Key really pushed the #1 seed Vargas, taking the first game 12 and making the second game close before Vargas pulled away in a tie-breaker. Was this rust on the part of last year’s champion, the rise of Key’s singles game, or a combination of both?

– #9 Gaby Martinez crushed #8 @Carla Munoz 4,7 to setup an intriguing match against #1 Vargas. Gaby, Vargas, Paola, and Mejia form a very closely grouped top 4 in the sport right now, and it seems like anyone of the four could win any given day.

– #6 @Natalia Mendez got a solid win over Parrilla to get back to the quarters.

– #10 Salas edged her way past #7 Amaya in a tie-breaker.

– #2 Paola Longoria faced a much tougher than normal round of 16 opponent in Barrios, and in typical fashion the Bolivian played her frustratingly difficult style, making the game close but not able to come out on top.

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In the Quarters

– #9 Martinez, who has a tendency to roll into pro events without much in the way of ranking points and shaking things up, comprehensively beat Vargas 7,6 to move into the semis and put an immediate shake-down on the season. Martinez looks fit and strong, and Vargas had no answers.

– #4 Laime made it three in a row on the trot against her east coast rival #5 Lawrence, cruising to a 5,3 win to move into the semis.

– #3 Mejia struggled but advanced past #6 Mendez in a breaker.

– #2 Longoria played her doubles partner Salas for the 62nd time on tour, and as they often do went to the breaker before Paola moved on.

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In the Semis

– #9 Martinez saved match points in the second game and advanced over Laime to get to the final.

– #2 Longoria held on to top Mejia for the 8th time in their last 9 meetings. After a nice run where Montse seemed to have Paola figured out … the GOAT has turned the tides.

In the Finals … a pretty incredible match. Longoria came out firing, and destroyed Gaby 15-3 in game one. The Guatemalan returned the favor and nearly reversed the scoreline in game two, holding leads of 10-0 and 14-3 before Paola clawed back a few to make it a little more respectable.

In the tie-breaker, it was back and forth. Martinez jumped up to a 6-3 lead, Paola got it back and got to match point at 10-9 against. They played an amazing rally, with both players hitting passing shots and then defensive shots to stay in the rally. It ended with a cracked out wide angle pass for Gaby to save the match point against and get back in the box. She won a straight forward rally to get to 10-10, then aced Paola to the forehand as she had been doing most of the game for the win. Its Gaby’s 3rd ever LPRT title.

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Points Implications of results

This is the first event of the new season, and for a few weeks these points will just add on to the end of last season’s points. Thanks to Vargas’ very early exit, Longoria should regain #1 on tour until the point where last year’s World singles & Doubles expires … at which point Vargas will regain #1. It should stay that way for the next event’s seeding. With this big win, Gaby will move up to #5. Samantha should move up to #10.

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Doubles review

Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/txk

Lots of tiebreakers in this solid LPRT doubles draw. #1 Mejia/Laime survived a scare in the quarters to eventually take the title, with Montse not missing a beat without her normal partner. They beat team Argentina in the final, who had put a shot early loss on Longoria & Salas in the semis.

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– Lexi York got a walkover win against Lotts in the Women’s open singles final.

– Michelle Key and new beau Rhys Anderson took the Mixed Open Doubles draw over Velpuri and Ty Hedalen.

– Erik Garcia topped Nick Riffel in the Men’s Open singles final, a draw that featured an appearance from former touring pro and Denver resident Woody Clouse .

– The Men’s Open draw featured two top10 IRT pros, but neither came out on top. The draw was taken by Garcia and @Brady Yelverton , who topped @Rocky Carson

and @Charles George in the final.

Carson also played @Adam Manilla in a pro exhibition for the fans.

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Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Timothy Baghurst, Jerry J Josey Jr., JTRball, and Tj Baumbaugh

Reminder to Players! Please like and follow this page so that when I tag you, you see it. Facebook will only retain tags of people that like/follow a page, which means lots of you are not getting the notoriety of getting tagged and noticed on Facebook. If your name is here and it isn’t tagged … it probably means I attempted to tag you but Facebook stripped it.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMbIP9SZd0MssH_nPGU/edit?usp=sharing

Our next big event is Worlds! At the end of the month, the @inteInternational Racquetball Federation – IRF World Championships returns to US soil for the first time in decades. The USAR is looking forward to hosting and putting on a show.

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tags

LPRT

USA Racquetball

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LPRT 2024 Mile High Open Preview

Centellas returns after a long absence; Photo unknown.

Welcome back pro racquetball! It’s the kickoff to the LPRT 2024-25 season. The tour is in Denver for the 2024 Frontline Family Foundation Mile High Open at the Denver Athletic club. The tour was in Denver last year for World Singles and Doubles, but hasn’t had a sanctioned part of this long-running Mile High Open since 2015, so that’s great to see.

The draw is out and it’s healthy with a bunch of familiar names who missed big chunks of the previous season. Players like Lotts, MRR, Centellas, Barrios, and Enriquez are competing this weekend, some for the first time in more than a year, and their inclusion makes for some really interesting first round matches.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=42406

We’ve got a couple of key absences: 4th seeded Herrera is not playing, nor is #10 Manilla, who some thought might be ready to give it a try in her home town post hip surgery (she’s one of the tournament directors for the weekend). A couple of players ranked in the teens aren’t here either (Scott and Ros), otherwise a solid top 20 of players.

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Let’s preview the draw. Here’s some notable qualifying matches that i’m looking forward to in the Singles

In the 32s:

– 16/17 Sheryl Lotts versus Michelle Key should be a fun one. These two havn’t played each other in a top-level competition in nearly a decade. Key continues her return to the singles component of the sport after mostly focusing on doubles for the last decade.

– Newly married and U21 graduated Annie Roberts (now Annie Sanchez-Roberts) is here but has to deal with Guatemala’s Ana Gabriela Martínez to start.

– Nancy Enriquez is entered for the first time since January; she takes on #12 Lexi York in what could be a tough one for the American. Enriquez may not play full time but she’s always a tough out.

– Long-time touring vet Maria Renee Rodríguez is here, having completed her graduate degree from Liberty University (which is in Lynchburg VA, where I lived for several years). She takes on lefty Maria Paz Leal Riquelme in what could be a close one.

– Valeria Centellas is back for the first time since Nov 2023; she takes on #11 Jessica Parrilla in a tough opener for both. Centellas can get wins, as can Parrilla, so anything goes here.

– Susy Acosta is here, ensuring she has an appearance in her 27th straight season on tour, pretty amazing.

– Angelica Barrios is back; she starts off against lefty Chanis Leon from Florida.

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round of 16:

– 8/9 Gaby vs Carla Munoz is a tough draw for Carla, who has seemingly been stuck in that 8-9 range for a while.

– #5 Kelani Lawrence may have to face the tough veteran Nancy Enriquez if she gets past York.

– #6 Natalia Mendez won’t like either opponent she may face in Parrilla or Centellas; both are going to be tough outs for her.

– #7 Cris Amaya is an upset alert when she faces long-time top player Samantha Salas Solis , who may be ranked 10th but was just a few points out of 7th at the end of last season.

– Lastly, #2 Paola Longoria is set to face Barrios, a player who she lost to the last time they played in March 2023. Now, that was right in the midst of Longoria’s distracted 2022-23 season, so I wouldn’t expect a repeat.

A side note: this season will be telling for Longoria and her future in the sport. She did not win the Mexican elections she (and Salas) ran for, but there’s still a chance she represents her home country in the Mexican congress. If that comes to pass, one has to wonder how long she can continue to tour. It also goes without saying that she was recently married; does she wish to start a family soon? We know that isn’t a career-ender (see Vargas, Maria who has toured through three childbirths now) it can be a career-interruption for sure. We’ll see.

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Projected Qtrs:

– #1 Vargas vs Gaby: Martinez topped Vargas at World Singles & Doubles last year in this same city, so watch out for another upset here.

– Lawrence vs Laime: these two face off rather frequently, hailing from neighboring east coast states. Lawrence seems to have the upper hand, but Laime has a tendency to go on sneaky runs.

– #3 Mejia should have no issues advancing past whoever battles their way out of the #6 seed quadrant.

– #2 Longoria should advance past her doubles partner Salas, having played more than 70 times in the past on tour.

Semis:

– Vargas over Lawrence; there’s still a talent gap from Kelani to the top 4-5 players in the world, but she’s clearly narrowing it.

– Longoria over Mejia: Montserrat knows what she needs to do, but I suspect the altitude helps Longoria more than Mejia here.

Finals;

– Longoria over Vargas: I think Paola puts down a statement and opens the season with a win.

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Doubles review

A missing Herrera means that the dominant #1 doubles team is split up; Mejia picks up Laime for this event and is the #1 seed, but there’s solid teams throughout this draw. Barrios & Centellas as #8 will be a challenge for #1, but I still expect Mejia & Laime to move to the final.

From the bottom half, team Guatemala faces off against #2 Salas/Longoria in the opener; this is a doubles team that has gotten h2h wins in the past. However, i th ink #2 advances to the final and eventually tops Mejia & Laime for the win.

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Look for Streaming in the regular places; follow the LPRT on Facebook and sign up to get notifications when they go Live.

Look for Timothy Baghurst , Sandy Rios, Jerry J Josey Jr., and Tj Baumbaugh on the mike, calling the shots!

Coincidentally, if you’re interested in playing Fantasy Racquetball for this event, the links to the brackets are advertised on LPRT’s main page. The winner each week gets free swag!