Welcome to one of (if not) the biggest pro racquetball event of the season. Brainchild of @Adam Manilla and David ” Bobby” Horn two years ago, this event has quickly grown into a must-attend stop on the tour. In their first season, the crew got the portable court out of storage, then in their second year put that money towards a dual IRT-LPRT event to include Mixed Pro Doubles, a situation that continues this year.
This year’s event features a huge Men’s pro draw and the debut event for the Ladies pro 2026-27 season. We’ll do a preview of both here.
R2 Sports App link: see comments to get around new FB limitations.
https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54262
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IRT Singles Draw Preview
There’s a solid draw of 37 Male pros here, representing 8 countries. We’re missing two top players (#3 Flores, who continues to have Visa issues and #5 Montoya, who may not have been able to swing Worlds and the GSO while holding a real job).
Here’s some of the early round matchups to watch for, and some projections for the rest of the draw.
In the round of 64:
– Galicia vs Kurzbard in a fun international quality match between members of the Guatemalan and Argentinian teams. We haven’t seen Kurzbard in a minute; last time he played an IRT event was in 2023 in Denver, and before that the US Open in 2017. But he just represented his country at Worlds and made the trip.
– Anthony Martin vs David Horn: Horn is pulling double duty doing tournament production and playing, and is still nursing a shoulder/arm issue from earlier this year. Martin has been playing tour events for years now and is a tough out.
– Erik Garcia vs Alejandro Robles Picon: Garcia is a 2-time Intercollegiates champ back in 2018-19, while Robles Picon is one of the better juniors out there, the reigning Mexican 14U National champ but still playing out of the Pleasanton/Stockton area.
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In the round of 32, here’s some fun ones to look for:
– #9 Trujillo vs Mangalampalli: Trujillo has the hot hand, and he starts this event with the local top US Junior Vaishant, who gets another crack at what it takes to be a top IRT pro.
– #12 Diego Gastelum vs #21 Diego Garcia: the best match of the round by far, and one that should be happening in the quarters instead of the 32s. Garcia curiously didn’t attend Worlds two weeks ago for his country, but makes the trip up here. Meanwhile, Gastelum has been grinding his way closer to the top 10. This may look like a blowout by seed, but Garcia is the favorite here.
– Carrasco-Salvatierra looks like a group stage IRF match. Carrasco is the higher seed but Salvatierra should challenge here.
– Martell- Collins features two veterans who know their way around the court.
– Natera-Castillo: see below.
Lastly, we have a slew of Mexican juniors in town, and a little birdie tells us to keep an eye out for the likes of Javier Gonzalez (18U player from Chihuahua), Salim Gonzalez (also an 18U player from Chihuahua), Santiago Galina (Mexican 21U player from San Luis Potosi), but especially Santiago Castillo, who was the World 16U runner-up last year in his age 15 season and is the two-time defending Mexican 16U champ. Castillo plays into #10 Alan Natera in the opener, and could get a quick shock upset to the draw.
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Round of 16 projected matches to watch for:
– In the 8/9 seed match we project to get Trujillo-Portillo, a great match of the Mexican players who have (or are poised) to take over the mantle of Mexico’s best now that the previous generation (DLR, Landa, Beltran) has moved on and the current generation (Montoya, Mar, etc) is aging.
– Garcia-Bredenbeck could be a barn burner. Diego has beaten Jake the last three times they’ve played, but two of those meetings were on the IRF using rally scoring and with full coaching staffs on site. Will it be different on tour?
– Manilla vs the Salvatierra/Carrasco winner: a great opportunity for Adam to make a deep run starts here.
– Acuna- Alonso should be interesting, in that Acuna missed Worlds and has been nursing an injury.
– Natera-Mar in the 7/10 would be great, if both players get there. both will have stiffer challenges in the 32s than they’d probably like.
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Projected Qtrs:
– #1 Moscoso over #8 Portillo: same matchup as in Fullerton.
– #21 Garcia over #4 Manilla: I see a big run for the dark horse Argentine
– #6 Parrilla over #3 Acuna: Andree has the h2h advantage here.
– #2 Waselenchuk over whoever comes out of the Natera/Mar quarter.
Semis:
– Moscoso stops Garcia … but this is no gimmie. Garcia beat Moscoso in the 2025 PARC semis and Moscoso needed a fifth game 12-10 to beat him in the World Games last year.
– Waselenchuk over Parrilla, rekindling an old rivalry that’s included a triple donut and an 11-10 tiebreaker win for Andree.
Finals; Yes, it’s boring but i’ve got 1v2, Kane v Conrrado for the 6th time in the last 9 finals on tour. Golden State 2024 featured a Kane win in a field w/o Conrrado (he had an arm injury), while Golden State 2025 featured a Conrrado win from a field without Kane (he had to miss last year’s even due to a wedding). This year, in year three, we hopefully get the two of them meeting on Sunday. I took Conrrado in Fantasy Fastbreak, but it’s a coin flip. The conditions (sea level, California heavy air, slower FormulaFlow ball, and panel courts) would seem to favor Kane, but Conrrado is entering a stretch between now and next March where he has to win to stay Number 1. This could be his year to finally finish #1, but he has to win here to keep pace.
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LPRT Draw Preview
The Ladies singles draw has 17 players as the LPRT kicks off its 2026-27 season, a pivotal one that will feature a changing of the guard both on and off the court. Long-time LPRT commissioner TJ Baumbaugh has indicated she’s stepping down, and there also seems to be a changing of the guard amongst the players as well. Long-time tour stalwart Paola Longoria just had a kid and may be off the tour for a while, and this event is missing a big chunk of the current top 10. This results in the two Argentines Vargas & Centellas being the two top seeds in the singles draw.
Here’s a preview of the Singles draw:
Round of 32: there’s just one match in the 32s, and it’s a good one. #16 Camila Rivero, the 3-time defending world 21U champ who is fresh off of a Worlds appearance representing Brazil takes on Andrea Perez-Picon, who was a finalist at World Juniors 16U last year. It has been a while since we’ve had a Bolivian junior champion matriculate to the pro tour and stick; perhaps we’ll see a run from Rivero.
In the 16s, here’s some to watch:
– #1 Vargas vs Rivero/Perez-Picon winner: the recently crowned world champ has a massive lead atop the rolling 365 day standings to start the season, and kicks it off against a young rival.
– In the 8/9 we get Manilla vs Parrilla. Both were in Chile representing their countries at Worlds. It has been a minute since Erika has been able to compete well in Singles after a hip injury derailed her career; it should be interesting to see how she moves this weekend.
– Herrera vs Scott: speaking of players who we haven’t seen in a while, former USA #1 Hollie Scott is here and has a possibly winnable match again a player in Herrera who’s been waning a bit lately on tour.
– #2 Centellas, who has her highest career seed, gets former US National champ Naomi Ros for her troubles. This one could go either way.
Projected Qtrs:
– Vargas over Manilla; this used to be a finals quality match between the two hardest hitters on tour. Hope we can get back there.
– Herrera over Salas: amazing that last year I thought Salas was retiring; now she’s the 5th seed in the season opener.
– Mendez-Amaya: long-time international rivals rekindle their head-to-head.
– Centellas – Sanchez: A great opportunity for Annie (Roberts) Sanchez to get to a semi.
Semis and Final: It’s hard not to predict against anything but a Vargas win right now on tour; she’s lost her primary rival in Longoria, and the only other two players in the world who can press her (Mejia and Gaby) aren’t here this week.
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Doubles preview: no doubles draws available as of this writing.
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Look for Streaming in the regular places; follow the IRT on Facebook and sign up to get notifications when they go Live. Also, since the LPRT is here, we’ll have dueling coverage from all your favorite voices. Look for Carrie Reitmeier, JT Rball, Rodrigo, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, and the IRTLive crew all weekend for the men, and listen for Timothy Baghurst, Sandy Rios, Jerry J Josey Jr. for the women.
Thanks to the event sponsors: Presenting sponsor: JMB: Jacobs Malcolm & Burtt produce and Gold sponsors: Reignstorm group, Visit Tri Valley,Manilla Athletics, Camp Run Amuk
Thanks to IRT tour sponsors: KWM Gutterman, Frank Hotels, Papa Nicholas coffee
Reignstorm Group; tax and wealth management, Gearbox, Formula Flow, and
Black & White Energy drinks.
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Associations
International Racquetball Tour
@lprt
No links added to the website article?
I’m just slow 🙂