Category: Doubles

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2026 SoCal Open Preview

Moscoso takes back over #1 for this event. Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory

Hello Racquetball fans! We are back after a summer off, ready to kick of the 2026-27 @International Racquetball Tour season. This weekend, the tour is in Fullerton, California for the 2026 SoCal Open, held at the WallisBank Qube fitness center.

We’re glad to be back in Fullerton for the second year running, and glad to back in Southern California for the first time since the Players Championship last April.

R2 link for the weekend: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54373

This is the first Tier 1 of the season, but we’ve hosted three satellite events in August and September to get ready

– Costa Rica Open in August: Parrilla beat Montoya in the final.

– the DMV invitational in Sept: Gastelum beat Franco in the final.

– Garden City Carl Meyers event last week: Manilla beat Carter in the final.

Despite winning the 2025-26 title for his 16th career season ending title, Kane enters this event ranked #2. How is that possible? Well I’ll tell you. The 2025-26 season was a special one, extended to be an 18 month season so as to move back to a fall to spring schedule. Each Player’s best 10 results from all the way

back to Jan 2026 counted in their rankings.

As of the beginning of the new 26-27 season, we’re back to a 365 day rolling calendar, meaning a player’s best 10 results now start, as of this event, as of the end of September in 2025, which was the 2025 Tracktown Open. Based on that sample, Moscoso has taken over as #1 on tour.

Intersetingly, despite being the two highest ranked players, both Conrrado and Kane only have 8 results in the sample size, so their first two results in the new season will be pretty important to determine who has the upper hand in the early part of the season. When Trackdown expires (which Kane won and Moscoso lost in the semis), Conrrado will get a bit of a bump, but when the next event falls of (the Mid Oct 2025 golden state open), Kane will get a big bump b/c he missed that event altogether.

Quick look at the draw

24 players. 32s on thursday, 16s friday, then quarters and semis on Saturday before a noon sunday singles final.

Big story: missing #4 Flores thanks to some visa/immigration issues, which immediately puts him behind the 8ball this season to try to move into the top echelon of tour. We’re also missing #6 Jake Bredenbeck and #7 Adam Manilla, both of whom had personal conflicts for this one.

Projected early matches to watch out for

32s: Trujillo-Emir Martinez, bobby Horn-Diego Gastelum

16s: Moscoso-Pratt, Portillo-Carter, Acuna-Trujillo, Mar-Alonso, Natera-Gastelum

Predictions? The loss of Flores really opens up the top half of the draw for Moscoso. You never root against Kane, who will probably have to beat

both Natera and Montoya on Saturday to give us another match against the Bolivian number one, but that’s what we’re all hoping for by Sunday.

Look for Carrie Reitmeier, JT Rball, Rodrigo, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, and the IRTLive crew all weekend on the microphone, calling the shots!

This week starts the new IRT Club exclusive broadcasting of Saturday and Sunday’s matches, so make sure you sign up for the IRT Club so you don’t miss out on the action.

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Before we leave, a quick shoutout to our sponsors, without whom professional racquetball would not be possible.

This weekend’s tournament Director is : Gerardo Duenas

Gold sponsors: NMRA and Cindy Tillbury, Jamal Khawaja with Kind Home Loans and Friends of Pakistan USA community group.

Silver sponsors: Placentia Town Center and Jeff Gold, HMS Realty and Ken Courtney, Reyes Single Ply Roofing contractors and Francisco Reyes.

Tour sponsors:

KWM Gutterman:

Frank Hotels

Papa Nicholas coffee

Reignstorm Group; tax and wealth management

Gearbox

Formula Flow

Black & White Energy drinks

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2026 South American Games Recap

Vargas wins twice and powers Argentina to the team win. Photo via usaracquetballevents.com

The @iInternational Racquetball Federation – IRF hosted the racquetball component of the 2026 South American games this week, just the 4th time that this regional competition has hosted the sport.

The South American games were created way back in 1978 and serve as a regional Olympic-style sports competition for just the countries of that continent. Thi

Racquetball first made its way into the competition in 1998, the 6th iteration of the event, but the results of that tournament are lost to history. It did not return until 2007, when the IRF held an out of cycle event in Ecuador. Then the sport was omitted for the next couple of events, returning in 2018 when the event was held in racquetball-crazed Cochabamba, Bolivia.

This past weekend technically is thus the 4th time the sport has bee included in the 13 iterations of the event, and once again the host city/country seems to play a part, since Argentina is hosting this year’s competition.

Five countries participated: Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, and Peru. Despite efforts to relaunch Colombia’s NGB, there were no Colombians here, nor players from other SA countries that have sent representatives internationally in the past like Venezuela and elsewhere.

In the end, as one might expect, the competitions all ended up being Bolivia vs Argentina in the latter stages, technically being Bolivia versus “players who were all born in Bolivia but who now play for Argentina.”

here’s a quick recap:

Congrats to the champions:

Men’s Singles: Conrrado Moscoso
Women’s Singles: @Maria Jose Vargas
Men’s Doubles: Conrrado Moscoso & @Kadim Carrasco
Women’s Doubles: Maria Jose Vargas & @Valeria Centellas
Mixed Doubles: @Diego Garcia & Natalia Mendez V.

Argentina takes 3 of the five draws against its rival Bolivia to “win” the event.

PRS links to draws in the database:
Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/6b326d
Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/ed5c01
Men’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/cef63f
Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/cef63f
Mixed Doubles: https://rball.pro/3f1835

R2sports link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54366

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Quick narratives about the draws:

Men’s Singles: The group stage was chalk, and the best match of the competition was probably the semifinal between Flores and Garcia. Flores took it 11-9 in the fifth, but it was yet another reminder that we need to see Garcia on the pro tour more regularly. I have a hard time not believing he’d be pushing for a top 5 spot if he made 100% of the events. In the final, Moscoso remained undefeated against his countryman across Amateur, IRF, and IRT events with a 3-game win.

Women’s Singles: Bolivia has seen a bit of a gap in its top women’s competitors thanks to Barrios’ knee injury; their representatives here were Camila Rivero and Valeria Miranda Martinez, who both fell to LPRT regulars in the knockouts. Rivero is the 3-time defending World Junior 21U champ but who has only a handful of pro tourneys under he belt; she lost in the semis to top-8 pro Mendez in five. Vargas cruised past her country-woman and now former doubles partner Mendez in the final.

Men’s Doubles: Ecuador’s Ugalde & Cueva was the top seed here thanks to their making the semis at PARC earlier this year (the highest finish of any South American country), and they finished 2nd in the group stage to the powerhouse Bolivian team of Moscoso/Carrasco. Argentina was missing Gerson Miranda, leaving the veteran Kurzbard playing along side Diego Garcia. The Argentines avenged a group stage loss to Ecuador in the semis of the knockouts, but then took a heavy loss to the Bolivians in the title game.

Women’s Doubles: It was Argentina and Bolivia 1-2 in the group stage, and then 1-2 in the final. Rivero teamed with long-time Bolivian veteran @Jenny Daza to press the Argentines in the final to 5 games, but they ultimately fell.

Mixed Doubles: The power of Flores could not push team Bolivia over Argentina, as Mendez outhit Dava one the right-hand side to make the difference in both their group stage and in the gold medal match.

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For the rest of the weekend’s competition, the players are all playing “team” competitions.

Congrats to all participants.

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Mexico Worlds Selection Event 2026 Recap

Portillo is taking over Mexican Racquetball. Photo US Open 2019, Photographer Kevin Savory

For just the second time that I can recall, the @federacion Mexicana de Raquetbol (FMR) held a stand alone qualification event to determine its team for an upcoming International event. In this case, Mexico’s best descended upon Tijuana last weekend for the 2026 Worlds Selection event, playing the whole slate of events (singles, doubles, and Mixed) to determine the team that will be heading to Worlds in Chile this coming October.

This was a special event for the history of Mexican Racquetball; the legendary multi-champion @Alvaro Beltran played in all three divisions, reportedly to be the final time he competes for Mexican Nationals after a decades long career at the top.

Here’s a recap of the play. As with their Jr. Nationals events, the singles draws play double elimination, with the winner’s bracket champion and the consolation bracket champs earning the right to represent.

Congrats to your Winners and team representatives:

– Men’s Singles: Eduardo Portillo and Andree Parrilla

– Women’s Singles: Alexandra Herrera and Jessica Parrilla

For the doubles: the winners will represent Mexico:

– Men’s Doubles: Eduardo Portillo & Andree Parrilla

– Women’s Doubles: Alexandra Herrera & Samantha Salas

– Mixed Doubles: Rodrigo Montoya & Samantha Salas

Here’s links to the draws/data in ProRacquetballStats.com:

– Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/b841e9

– Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/c9dba7

– Men’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/fb49e0

– Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/b5eb15

– Mixed Doubles: https://rball.pro/e141e1

R2sports link for the event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54255

And here’s recaps of the five pro draws.

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– Men’s Singles:

Some of the up-and-coming players in both Mexico and the Pro scene fought well, but couldn’t overtake the veterans in the FMR. Trujillo, Hernandez, and Gastelum all pushed but eventually fell to Parrilla, Mar, and Montoya respectively in the early rounds. The Trujillo-Parrilla 4/5 seed quarter had to be amazing to watch, going to a 5th game and ending 17-15 in favor of Andree.

In the semis, reigning Mexican national champ Eduardo Portillo held serve against Parrilla to advance from the top seed, while #2 seed Rodrigo Montoya continued his recent dominance over his doubles partner Mar to also reach the final and setup a rematch from earlier this year between the two top players. In the final, Lalo once again came out on top, claiming the automatic berth to Worlds and the title. In the consolation final, Parrilla once again got the better of his long-time rival Montoya in a brutal 5 game match that included several “overtime” games.

– Women’s Singles:

This draw looked quite odd, in that it was missing the very-pregnant Paola Longoria and arguably Mexico’s top player Montse Mejia. In their absence, Alexandra Herrera cruised to the title, beating Jessica Parrilla in three. Parrilla came back around to claim the 2nd Worlds spot with relative ease, beating Rivera in the consolation final.

– Men’s Doubles:

Men’s Doubles saw a possible “changing of the guard” match happen, when the long-time dominant doubles team in the country Montoya & Mar were upset in the semis by the young team of Trujillo and Gastelum in five. They earned the right to take on defending Mexican doubles champs Portillo & Parrilla in the final. There, for the second time this year, Lalo & Andree won a Mexican major title to earn the right to represent Mexico; they both will now be the singles and doubles representatives in worlds.

– Women’s Doubles

With her long-time doubles partner Mejia missing, Herrera picked up the legendary veteran Samantha Salas for this event. Only three teams entered, so Herrera/Salas won their semi to take on Parrilla/Rivera in the final. There, Herrera and Salas took the title to send Samantha back to an International event for the 13th time in her career.

– Mixed Doubles.

In the somewhat recent history of top-level Mixed Pro Doubles action, Rodrigo Montoya and Samantha Salas have proven to be perhaps the best Mixed doubles team we’ve ever seen, regularly winning or making the finals of major Mixed competitions. They teamed up again this weekend as the top seeds and took out Mar/Herrera in the final to claim their spots for Chile. Salas double-qualifies for Worlds with the win.

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Congrats to the Mexican team heading to Worlds; they’ll certainly be tough to beat. They’ll enter as favorites alongside Bolivia, who shouldn’t have any travel issues with an event in South America and should be sending a full strength squad.

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Quick recap of the 2026 DMV Invitational

Diego Gastelum with the double in DC. Photo via Ken Fife

The second satellite event of the new 2026-27 @International Racquetball Tour season was last weekend; here’s a quick recap of the pro draws.

Severna Park used to host a full tier stop in the fall, but for the last couple of years has downsized to a Satellite event (this event was an IRT-400, which prevents any of the top 4 players from even entering), but it still draws from the big Bolivian community in the DC area as well as from the general mid-Atlantic region. In fact, it is at this very club where Waselenchuk tore his Achilles in Sept 2022, which sent the player and the tour on a several-year whirlwind of results and champions, now ended with the return of Kane to the top for the last couple of seasons.

Here’s a quick recap of the play this past weekend.

Men’s Pro Singles

The draw featured two touring regulars; #1 Thomas Carter and #2 @Diego Gastelum. They’re currently ranked 12th and 14th on tour, but Gastelum has been getting a bit of attention lately for his solid results on tour at the end of last season, especially a win over Montoya at Pro Nationals that earned him his first quarterfinal. Also lurking in the draw was @Sebastian Franco, a long-time top-10 pro who lives in the area after retiring from touring. Franco made fast work of solid NY-based open player Aaron Dardani, then took out Carter in the quarters 10,10. He ground out a tie-breaker win from Ohio-based Victor Migliore to make the final from the top side.

From the bottom half, another solid international living in the area Ezequiel Subieta advanced to the semis before falling to Gastelum in two. In the final, Diego cruised past Franco 4,6 to take the singles title.

Men’s Doubles

Gastelum teamed with Subieta to take the Pro Doubles title, beating Juan Pablo Rodriguez / Thomas Carter in the final to give the Mexican the double for the weekend.

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Next up for the tour? Another Satellite in Garden City, Kansas later this month, then the first Tier 1 is in October in Fullerton. We’ll be back on the Fantasy Fastbreak Podcast before then.

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IRT 2026 Costa Rica Open Satellite Recap

Parrilla takes the Costa Rica Open with three solid wins. Photo 2019 US Open via Kevin Savory

The 2026-27 @iInternational Racquetball Tour season technically kicked off this past weekend with a Satellite event in San Jose, Costa Rica at the home club of current #3 ranked pro @Andres Acuña , the 2026 Costa Rica Open.

This was rated as an IRT-600 event, so one level below a full Tier 1 IRT-700 event. However, because it’s a satellite, the rules governing entry limit the field to only four of the current top 8 players, with no limit on the number of players entering outside the top 8 at the time of the event.

The top 8 ranked players in this event were: #3 Acuna, #4 Rodrigo Montoya Racquetball , #5 @jhonatan flores, and #8 @Andree Parrilla. They formed in this order the top four seeds. But, the event drew a slew of IRT regulars as well, making this a very solid event from the 16s onward. The rest of the top 8 seeds were all IRT veterans: Mar, Carter, Trujillo, and Gastelum, and then the event featured a slew of international regulars who we normally see in IRF events.

Here’s a quick recap of the notable results.

In singles: the top 8 seeds advanced into the quarters without too much trouble: #8 Diego Gastelum was pressed to 13,12 against Guatemalan number one and #9 seed @Juan Jose Salvatierra, while #7 Trujillo dropped a game to former top Bolivian junior and current DC area native Ezequiel Subieta, but the rest of the top 8 made it through unscathed.

In the quarters, #1 Acuna was pressed in game 2 but beat Gastelum 5,14 to move on. Parrilla had to dig deep to top Mar 7,12. Flores had little trouble with Thomas Carter 1,6, and then Montoya ground out a 12,11 win over Trujillo in a matchup that seems to be closer and closer as Trujillo continues to move his way up the ranking boards on tour.

In the semis, Parrilla got an injury walkover against Acuna, leading 12-8 in the first game when Acuna couldn’t continue. Parrilla continues his career dominance over Acuna (he’s 7-3 in tier-1/international events over the Costa Rican). In the other semi, another injury issue, as Montoya won a close 1st game over Flores 15-13 then got a walkover early into the second game.

In the final, Parrilla got a in in the latest episode of their long running rivalry with Montoya, winning 12,11 for the title. Montoya leads the Tier1 h2h 13-9 over their long career, so this isn’t a completely unexpected result, but a good sign for Parrilla as he tries to work his way back up the rankings for next season.

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In doubles, the world’s best team Montoya/Mar took the title as the top seed, beating the #2 seeds Parrilla/Trujillo in two quick games for the doubles title.

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We’ll get a couple more IRT satellites in September (one in DC, one in Kansas) before our first tier 1 event in October in Fullerton.

In the meantime, i’ve updated the Running IRT points spreadsheet for this event as the points calendar switches back to a 12 month schedule.

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IRF 2026 Central American & Caribbean Championships wrap-up

Herrera wins her first ever International singles title. Photo Denver 2021 KenFife

The IRF hosted its recurring Central American & Caribbean Games, returning to the Dominican Republic for the 2026 iteration of the event.

This is the 10th iteration of these games that have had a racquetball component. The first one was in 1990, when Mexico hosted the event and its two singles components were won by Raul Torres and Hilda Rodriguez of Mexico, two very early pioneers of Mexican racquetball. In fact, Mexico has always dominated this competition, winning 12 of the previous 16 singles titles and sweeping all 5 titles in the 2023 version.

Countries participating this year: host Dominican Republic, Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Venezuela, and Cuba. Venezuela is an odd entry, as they are in neither Central America or the Caribbean, but hey I don’t make the rules. It is not the first time a South American country has bee included in this event. Heck, in 2018 Colombia HOSTED this event. I’m not entirely sure why Mexico is in this event year after year; they’re regularly included as a “North American” country, but I was a Math major, not Geography, so don’t listen to me.

Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

– Men’s Singles: Rodrigo Montoya

– Women’s Singles: Alexandra Herrera

– Men’s Doubles: Eduardo Portillo/Andre Parrilla

– Women’s Doubles: Montse Mejia/Alexandra Herrera

– Mixed Doubles: Andres Acuna/Larissa Faeth

Exec Summary: Mexico wins 4 of the 5 titles, but 15yr old Faeth gets another win for Costa Rica’s Adult team internationally.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54300

Match Reports in the PRS database post-load:

– Men’s Singles: https://rball.pro/18bf6e

– Women’s Singles: https://rball.pro/8dc8e2

– Men’ Doubles: https://rball.pro/9544e2

– Women’s Doubles: https://rball.pro/45b3f5

– Mixed Doubles: https://rball.pro/2bcd18

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Lets review the five main draws, calling out upsets and interesting results.

Men’s Singles:

The group stages were nearly 100% chalk, and with very few matches that even went beyond three games. The best match of the group stages was probably to determine 1st place in Group D, as Costa Rica’s Gabriel Garcia took out Guatemalan veteran Juan Jose Salvatierra in four close games to secure the #4 seed in the knockouts.

In the knockouts, the host Dominicans played well, with Luis Perez taking a game off of #1 seed Portillo in the quarters, and Dominican #1 Ramon De Leon upsetting Guatemala’s Garcia to reach the semis. Portillo had to go 5 games to top De Leon to make the final from the top, while two IRT top-10 players in Rodrigo Montoya and Andres Acuna battled it out from the bottom half, with Montoya advancing to return to the final. In a rematch of the 2023 final, Montoya blitzed Portillo 4,4,6 for the gold. It is first CAC singles gold, and his 4th career International gold medal.

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Women’s Singles:

The group stage was mostly without incident; the two Costa Rican women entries were probably slightly overseeded thanks to their performance in the most recent Int’l event, and both were “upset” in the group stage. This gave Venezuelan veteran Marina Tobon the 4th seed in the knockouts, where she was summarily upset by Dominican Maria Cespedes in the quarters.

The biggest upset of the tournament though was from Costa Rican 15yr old Larissa Faeth, who upset the 3rd seeded Montse Mejia in four games. Faeth, who is the two-time defending 14U world Junior champion, is now regularly representing Costa Rica in Adult competitions and advanced to the semis here before falling.

In the top semi #1 Alexandra Herrera cruised past Cespedes in three, while from the bottom half Guatemala’s Gaby Martinez ended Faeth’s run in three, setting up a top-10 LPRT final between two old rivals. In the final, Herrera got her first ever IRF win over Martinez to claim her first ever International singles title.

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Men’s Doubles:

A chalk group stage led to a 7-team knockout round with two heavy favorites … and one of them got upset in the semis. Costa Rica’s all-Acuna team of brothers Andres and Sergio got upset by the Guatemalans Salvatierra & Aldana in the semis to setup an unlikely final. In the gold medal match, team Mexico blitzed Team Guatemala to keep it an all Mexico gold affair.

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Women’s Doubles:

The entire Women’s doubles draw went chalk, in both the group stage and in the knockouts. Top seed and defending champ Team Mexico was represented by Herrera & Mejia, one of the best doubles teams in the history of the sport and winners of dozens of titles both internationally and professionally; they advanced to the final from the top half. From the bottom half, long-time Guatemalan partners Gaby Martinez and Maria Renee (Rodriguez) Josey also cruised into the final to face off. In the final, Team Mexico made it 4-for-4 with a 8,4,8 win over the Guatemalans.

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Mixed Doubles:

An upset free group round set the stage for the two top seeds (from Mexico and Costa Rica) to meet, but both were pushed before they got there. Team Costa Rica (featuring top-4 IRT player Andres Acuna and 15-yr old phenom Larissa Faeth) had to dig deep to top the Cubans in one semi, while team Mexico (featuring Rodrigo Montoya and Jessica Parrilla) got pushed to 5 games by team Guatemala before advancing. In the final, the top seeded Costa Rican team won their second straight IRF event, following up on their gold together in the PARC event in March, with a solid 4-game win over team Mexico. The 15yr old Faeth held her own along the right against veteran pro Parrilla and they got the win.

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The players will remain in the DR for a couple more days playing a Team event before heading home.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

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

Next up on the calendar is the 2026 Mexican Junior Nationals next weekend. There’s an IRT-600 satellite event later in the month. Sometime in early August, look for Season in Review articles from yours truly recapping both the IRT and LPRT seasons.

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2026 Outdoor Nationals & World Championships Recap

The McDonald clan, headlined by eldest son Chris, took home six titles this weekend in California. Photo 2023 Outdoor Nats via Lara

This past weekend, the 52nd annual Outdoor Nationals tournament was held at Marina Park in Huntington Beach, California. Here’s a recap of the weekend’s event.

Congrats to your Pro/Open winners on the weekend:

– Men’s Pro Doubles: Kane Waselenchuk and Chris McDonald

– Women’s Open Doubles: Karen Grisz and Marie Gomar

– Mixed Open Doubles: Jack McDonald and Martha McDonald

There were no pro singles draws this year.

Exec summary: Kane wins his third straight Outdoor Nationals title, and his second straight with Chris McDonald. Martha and Jack McDonald defended their 2025 Mixed Open title, avenging a group stage loss in the final. Lastly in Women’s, Gomar, Marie and Grisz, Karen became first time winners.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=51162

ProRacquetballStats.com Match Reports by Pro division (notification that the results have been loaded to the database):

– Men’s Pro Doubles: https://rball.pro/3194ac

– Women’s Pro Doubles: https://rball.pro/15da8c

– Mixed Pro Doubles: https://rball.pro/15da8c

Triple Crown Reports: (these show the winners of all Pro divisions at all WOR outdoor majors across time)

– Men’s Pro Doubles: https://rball.pro/j47

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

– Mixed Pro Doubles: https://rball.pro/y43

– Men’s Pro Singles: https://rball.pro/86z

– Women’s Pro Singles: https://rball.pro/x8g

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Lets do a quick recap of the Pro/Open draws.

Men’s Pro Doubles: The men’s pro doubles draw had a slew of legends playing this year, including Greg Solis and Ravi Sohoni, past winners Brandon Davis & Josh Tucker, future hall of famer Rocky Carson & recently inducted Jesus Ustarroz, and of course my podcasting partner Brian Pineda . However, the draw was no match for the power of last year’s champs Kane Waselenchuk & Chris McDonald, who blew through the draw to repeat as champs.

Rocky & Jesus outlasted the long-time outdoor legends Solis & Ravi in the quarters, but fell 11-9 in the semis to Davis & Tucker. In the final, Kane & Chris ground out a 15-12 first game win, then blew their way to a 15-3 second game and the title.

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Women’s Open Doubles:

Four teams of ladies Open/Elite outdoor players played a well-balanced round robin draw, where three of the teams wen 2-1 and the finalists had to be determined by point differential. In the final, Marie Gomar & Karen Grisz avenged a group stage loss to Sandra Ramos Mowry & Susie Boulanger to take the title.

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Mixed Open Doubles: The legendary @Martha McDonald teamed with younger son Jack to finish 2nd in the group stage to the surprise team of Adrianna Moncada & Georges Barrera, then avenged the group stage loss in the final to repeat as champions.

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Other Major Draws in California:

– CPRT: Kane & Chris got the double win this weekend, taking out Carson & Ustarroz in the final.

– Men’s 75s: Brothers Chris and Jack McDonald teamed up to take the title, beating Sweet Lou Orosco and Max Heymann in the final.

– Men’s 100/Centurion: The biggest draw of the event was 100+, with 13 teams. In the final, Miguel Arriola / Tony Hernandez rebounded from a 15-0 first game loss to beat Scott St Clair / Tony Burg in a breaker for the title.

– Men’s Open: Brandon Davis / Brian Pineda ground their way to an Open title, beating Greg Solis / Lou Orosco in the final.

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Congratulations to the 2026 Hall of Fame Class, who were inducted Saturday afternoon. Kevin Booth and Greg Freeze both had decades-long dominance in the sport and in Outdoor Nationals and are well deserving. To read their bios, go to these links:

Booth: https://www.usaracquetball.com/news/2026/june/23/kevin-booth-wor-hall-of-fame-inductee-class-of-2026

Freeze: https://www.usaracquetball.com/news/2026/june/23/greg-freeze-wor-hall-of-fame-inductee-class-of-2026

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Thanks to the Tourney Directors Peggine Tellez, Mike Coulter, and the whole 3WallBall crew, who have now taken over Outdoor Nationals. Thanks once again to all the sponsors who make this event possible.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar … https://docs.google.com/…/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMb…

NMRA Masters is next weekend in Tempe, then August has both Mexican Junior Nationals and the IRF Central American & Carribean games, always a fun regional event.

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@3Wall Ball

@WOR – World Outdoor Racquetball

Mike Coulter

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2026 USA Racquetball Junior Nationals Recap

DJ Mendoza has both outdoor and indoor chops, and won the Triple Crown at USA Junior Nationals this past weekend. Photo via Rick Bernstein

USA Racquetball held its 53rd annual Junior Nationals event last week in Des Moines, Iowa, getting some really huge draws for some of the mid-teen brackets in a promising sign for the future of tournament racquetball in the states.

With this post, is official notification that the Junior Nationals results have been entered into the ProRacquetballStats.com database. For Juniors, we upload full bracket results for 21s, 18s, 16s, and 14s, but just load up winners and finalists for all age groups younger than 14U. For doubles, we load up just the finalists.

The best way to see Junior Singles winners is with the cross-year/cross-age group Matrix reports built into the site. They show all the winners for all age divisions going back to 1974. Here’s direct links for each Matrix report:

– Boys USA Junior National Singles Champion Matrix: https://rball.pro/mey

– Girls USA Junior National Singles Champion Matrix: https://rball.pro/cpf

Each full division draw can be accessed from the “event” pulldown after you enter either the Juniors or the Junior Doubles section. One Junior Nationals results in 18-20 singles draws plus another 15 doubles draws being entered into the database, so there’s a lot of new data here this week.

R2sports home page for the 2026 event, with all the full brackets:

https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=50993

For 2026, congrats to your Boys Singles winners:

– Boys 21U: DJ Mendoza

– Boys 18U: London Townsend

– Boys 16U: Grant Williams

– Boys 14U: Scott Haacke

– Boys 12U: Ryan Joeckel

– Boys 10U: Damian Gil

– Boys 10Udb: Finn McGrath

– Boys 8U: Saharsh Gorthy

– Boys 8Umb: David Lopez

– Boys 6Umb: Vaihbhav Gorthy

Congrats to your Girls singles winners:

– Girls 21U: Naomi Ros

– Girls 18U: Alexis Boyko

– Girls 16U: Rebecca Christopher

– Girls 14U; Yana Alegria

– Girls 12U: Yana Alegria

– Girls 10U: Sameera Rai

– Girls 10Udb: Alyana Machado

– Girls 8U: Sasha Rai

– Girls 8Umb: Almira Pridatko

– Girls 6Umb: Nainika Singi

Congrats to your Boys Doubles winners:

– Boys 21U: Cole Sendrey & DJ Mendoza

– Boys 18U: Grant Williams & Evan Whitley

– Boys 16U: Grant Williams & Evan Whitley

– Boys 14U: Scott Haacke & Nicolas Suarez

– Boys 12U: Reyansh Chandel & Ryan Joeckel

– Boys 10U:Damian Gil & Luca Fernandez

Congrats to your Girls Doubles winners:

– Girls 21U: Naomi Ros & Ava Kaiser

– Girls 18U: Meyer, Elaina & Ortwerth, Stella

– Girls 16U: Boyko, Alexis & Christopher, Rebecca

– Girls 14U: Strobach, Addie & Whitley, Morgan

– Girls 12U: Singh, Riva & Marivada, Sloka

– Girls 10U: Rai, Sameera & Lu, Meiqi

And Congrats to your Mixed Doubles winners:

– Mixed 21U: Mendoza, DJ & Garcia Fatima Sanchez

– Mixed 18U: Reyes, Brandon & Torres, Montserrat

– Mixed 16U: Mangalampalli, Vaishant & Bawa, Sarah

– Mixed 14U: Haacke, Scott & Strobach, Addie

– Mixed 12U: Chandel, Reyansh & Marivada, Sloka

– Mixed 10U: Gil, Damian & Rai, Sameera

(Apologies for any typos: these were hand typed into this post, but should get typo-corrected in the database).

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Here’s some quick commentary on the Singles champions by grouping.

Boys Singles quick recaps

Boys 21U came down to Mendoza and Sendrey once again, and once again DJ came out on top. These two have also met on the IRT recently, and after early career h2h dominance Mendoza has now taken over in their rivalry. In 18U, London Townsend (finalist last year) was able to take it one step further and claim his first Junior National title. Grant Williams, who was the losing finalist in four straight Junior National events prior to this year, finally got the gold, taking the 16U title with a dominant performance end to end.

In 14U, Scott Haacke took his second title (he won 12U two years ago). In 12U, Ryan Joeckel won his second straight title. Damien Gil took his first junior title in 10U while Finn McGrath took his first 10Udb title. Saharsh Gorthy took his 2nd straight 8U age group title, this year moving up from Multi-bounce. David Lopez took this year 8Umb title, and Saharsh’s younger brother Vaibhav Gorthy won the 6Umb division.

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Girls Singles quick recaps

LPRT touring pro and 2025 US National champ Naomi Ros won her 6th straight junior national title since converting over from Mexico; she has one remaining year in U21. Alexis Boyko, who has had a couple of silver medals in the past, broke through in 18U for her first Junior National title. Yana Alegria, who two years ago won 10U, took both the 12U and 14U title, something we havn’t seen in Junior Nationals for some time. Sameera Rai took the 10U title for her 2nd career win. Alyana Machado won her first title in 10Udb, beating the 8U gold medalist Sasha Rai in the final. The two multi-bounce champions were both first time winners: Almira Pridako in 8Umb and then Nainika Singi in 6Umb.

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Multi-title winners

The following players took home the coveted “Triple Crown,” winning singles, gender doubles, and mixed doubles this year:

– 21U DJ Mendoza: singles, doubles with Sendry, Mixed with Sanchez

– 14U: Scott Haacke: singles, doubles with Suarez, Mixed with Strobach

– 10U: Damian Gill: singles, doubles with Fernandez, Mixed with Rai.

Also, special mention to Grant Williams, who won three golds this weekend: 16U singles, 18U doubles with Whitley, and 16U doubles with Whitley.

The following players took home the “double,” winning both Singles and a Doubles title in their age groups:

– Boys 12U: Ryan Joeckel

– Girls 21U: Naomi Ros

– Girls 18U: Alexis Boyko

– Girls 10U: Sameera Rai

Special mention to Yana Alegria for winning gold in both 14U and 12U.

These players took the “Double Double,” winning both Gender and Mixed doubles titles.

– 14U Girls and Mixed: Addie Strobach

– 12U Girls and Mixed: Sloka Marivada

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Phew. that’s it for USA 2026 Junior Nationals. Congrats to all the 2026 winners. The National team includes the two singles finalists and the doubles winners in each division; those players have first right of refusal to represent Team USA at Junior Worlds later this year at a date/site yet to be announced.

Next up on the racquetball calendar? 2026 Outdoor Nationals, teaming with 3WallBall this year in Huntington Beach! We’ll preview and recap that event as we always do. We also will announce the 2026 WOR Hall of Fame Class at 2026 Outdoor Nats.

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LPRT 2026 Northern Virginia Invitational Recap

Centellas has a career event, making her first pro final. Photo unknown.

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Singles: Maria Jose Vargas

– Doubles: Montse Mejia & Alejandro Herrera.

TL/DR executive Summary: Vargas finishes off the most dominant season on tour since the end of Longoria’s dominant run in the 2019-20 season, making the final of every event and winning all but one this season. Also, 3 of the 4 semi-finalists were Argentines, including a career run from Valeria Centellas to the pro final.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54043

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

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/d9335b

In the 16s, there were no real upsets, as all the top seeds cruised to victories against lower seeds and a few of the teenagers who made the trip.

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In the Quarters

– Vargas took out Munoz 4,10

– Mendez upset Herrera 14,9. I know this wasn’t an “upset” by seed, but historically Herrera has been the better player.

– In a monumental upset, #3 Gaby Martinez was upset by #6 Valeria Centellas in an 11-10 thriller. This is her career best win, and she makes the semis for just the second time in her career.

– Mejia cruised past Amaya 6,1.

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In the Semis

– Vargas downed her Argentine teammate Mendez without much trouble to get to the final for the 7th straight event.

– Centellas, one day after beating Gaby 11-10, beats Montse 11-10 to set a new “career best win” mark and to make her first pro final, ever.

In the all-Argentina finals, Centellas finally ran out of gas and Vargas blew her out 8,0 to take the crown.

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Points Implications of results

Vargas easily finishes #1, and by virtue of Longoria’s absence Mejia should take over #2 to finish the season. Centellas’ big run jumps her to #6 for the season, easily a career-high ranking. Munoz’ quarter final run gets her back into the top 10 for the end of the season, while Annie Sanchez’ absence dumps her out of the top 10 and she misses out on a first pro top-10 finish.

Here’s a link to my Rolling 2year Calendar XLS, which I use to approximate the points after each event. It is not exact but it’s usually close enough to the actual rankings, which @Ryan Rodgers does with @R2 Sports App on behalf of the tour after each event, to allow some quick post-event analysis before the rankings post.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16o0aE4YophvlQdezlMVj_dqPRUoDQqwE5-LtsLbOncg/edit?usp=sharing

When the tour publishes its final rankings, I’ll correct this xls, capture the data and do year-end data capture and posting.

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Doubles review

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

Mejia & Herrera blasted Vargas & Centellas 3,2 to prevent a double title for Vargas on the weekend.

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– Atlanta’s Maurice Miller won the Men’s Open singles draw.

– Miller and Troy Warigon took the Men’s Open Doubles draw.

– Costa Rican’ teenager Larissa Faeth beat out three members of team Guatemala to take Women’s Open singles

– Christopher Ruano / Suresh Vemulapalli beat two former contemporaries of mine, when I used to actually play racquetball at something of a high level, topping Jeff Wilson and Rich Benderoth for the Combined 75+ doubles title.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

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

This coming weekend is the final IRT event of the season, 2026 Gateway City Pro/Am in St. Louis. I’ll be doing podcasting work with @Brian Pineda this week, preview videos for the streaming, etc. Then the last event of the “season” will be US Junior Nationals later this month.

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tags

Posted on

LPRT Northern Virginia Invitational preview

Vargas has #1 sewn up; can she win one more? Photo US Open 2019 Kevin Savory

Well, it has been a minute since the Ladies Professional Racquetball Tour was in action, but here we are with one last event for the 2025-26 season. This is the 2026 LPRT Northern Virginia Invitational, being held at the Worldgate Club in Herndon, VA. This has always been one of the nicest clubs in the DC-area, just a few minutes from Dulles Airport and the flagship of a work/shopping complex that is home to more than a few tech firms that you may have heard of.

The Ladies tour has not had an event since January, a huge amount of time to be off, and a sign of the difficulties pro racquetball faces these days. The LPRT has lost half a dozen tournaments in the last few years alone; we used to have a slam in South Carolina at the Sweet Caroline Open, the Boston Open was a spring fixture, Malia Bailey used to get the crew together in Chesapeake at the end of every season, the Battle at the Alamo in San Antonio was a long-running LPRT stop, and of course for years the season ended with a Super Max slam in Kansas City thanks to Randy Root. All of these events are now gone for one reason or another, and the tour has struggled to get replacements.

The draw in DC is just 15 pros, and for the first time that I can remember there’s a bye in the round of 16 of a pro event. Hopefully the tour can rebound and put together a good slate of events for the fall.

#1 Maria Jose Vargas has officially sewn up the #1 ranking for the season; she has an unassailable lead at the top of the standings. We’ll cover her title and its implications in our season wrap up later this month. However, there’s still top 10 spots to jockey for, and the ladies in attendance are set to finish their season on a high note.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54043

draw size, observations

top 10 players missing; #3 Longoria (pregnant, work or both), #6 Laime (who just recently graduated grad school, congrats), #9 Lotts.

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Let’s preview the draw.

round of 16:

– Munoz vs MRR (ahem, Josey) in the 8/9 is a fun one.

– Teenager Costa Rica phenom Larissa Faeth takes on Tier 1 winner Alexandra Herrera.

– the newly minted Hall of Famer @Rhonda Rajsich battles @Valeria Centellas, who is now up to #8 in the rankings and is seeded 6th here.

– Stephanie Synhorst, new Northern Virginia resident with her USMC-related transfer to the Pentagon, takes on Amaya.

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Projected Qtrs:

– Vargas over Munoz, a frequent 1-8 matchup

– Herrera over Mendez. They’ve played 12 times across LPRT and IRF, and though Mendez got her the last time they played (2025 PARC), Herrera h olds a commanding lead in their meetings.

– Gaby over Valeria: Centellas has been impressing, but Gaby still is the better player here.

– Mejia over Amaya

Semis:

– Vargas over Herrera: Maria Jose is too powerful.

– Mejia over Gaby in a battle that’s been fought for more than a decade.

Finals; Vargas takes out Mejia to finish the season with another title.

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Doubles review

Just 5 teams entered, but world’s two top teams are seeded 1 and 2. Look for Vargas/Centellas to meet Mejia/Herrera and for Vargas to take the double.

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

Thanks to the Tourney Directors X and X for putting this event on!

Thanks to our main sponsors X and X and X; it goes without saying that without you and your support, we don’t have a sport.