Category: IRT

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Singles: Andres Acuña

The Costa Rican takes advantage of a slew of upsets to come out on top and win his second career Tier 1 title.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54042

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

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/760e6e

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In the 32s:

– LA-based former touring pro John Wolfe got an 11-9 win in the 16/17 seed match against Chicago’s Base Zera.

– DJ Mendoza needed a tiebreaker to beat his junior national doubles partner Cole Sendrey to move on.

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In the 16s:

– #8 Portillo got an injury walkover against Alonso in his 8/9 match to move on and save some effort on the court.

– #5 Montoya blasted Gastelum, who had upset him in the previous event, to move on.

– #4 Flores cruised past upset-minded Trujillo 5,4 after having been stretched to a breaker against him earlier this season

– #6 Parrilla had to go breaker to beat countryman Martell.

– #7 Manilla took out fellow American lefty #10 Carter to move on.

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In the Quarters

– #8 Portillo took out a somewhat disinterested Kane Waselenchuk in a breaker 9,(11),5. Kane often found himself slightly out of position on these very slow panel courts, hitting a number of balls between his legs or going for circus shots as the pace of play seemed to be throwing him off. Meanwhile, the slow courts and slow ball seemed better suited to Lalo’s game, as he cruised to a game 1 win and a lead in Game 2. At that point, a frustrated Kane, who the previous point had wanted an avoidable on a jam serve he was aiming at the right corner, blasted a full force forehand into Portillo’s leg, attempting again to hit that reverse pinch and again demanding an avoidable. To many, it seemed like an intentional shot meant to inflict pain, or intimidation. Lalo worked through the blast without comment or complaint, and eventually took the match, but the resulting bruise nearly covered his entire quad. Nonetheless, it ended Kane’s title-winning season early, and gave Portillo his second ever win over Kane (Lalo was on the court when Kane tore his Achilles back in Sept 2022).

– Montoya took out Flores 12,14 in a tight match of hard hitters.

– Acuna eased past Parrilla 8,5 and seems “on” this weekend for sure.

– Manilla beats his second US National teammate in a row, topping Jake 9,13 to make the semis.

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In the Semis, a wide-open field now missing both top seeds meant a title was there for the taking.

– #8 Portillo continued his run, beating #5 Montoya to make his 3rd final of the season.

– #3 Acuna beat #7 Manilla in a tactical battle 8,13 to move into just his second career final.

In the Finals, Acuna topped Portillo 7,12 to win his second ever Tier 1 title.

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Points Implications of results

Neither #1 Kane or #2 Moscoso changed their overall best 10 results, and finish the year 1-2 easily. Acuna’s title moves him to #3, jumping over Jake for 4th. Montoya’s h2h win over Flores seals 5th place for him over the Bolivian, while Portillo’s run to the title secures 7th place.

Mar’s last minute absence drops him to 10th, while Natera’s absence costs him a season top 10 finish; he drops to #11.

We’ll do our annual season-ending deep dive into the players once the season points are finalized.

Here’s a link to my IRT Rolling 2year Calendar XLS..

men

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1z6eg6NJT6fjGMfRRyKTNLShAiDoz0TzzmQCt1_SbNBo/edit?usp=sharing

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– There was no pro doubles, but the Open Doubles was stacked. It was taken by #3 seed Mexican youngsters Erick Trujillo / Alvaro Guillen.

– Guatemalan Juan Jose Salvatierra took the Open singles title, beating Mexican Miguel Angel Arteaga Guzman in the final.

– StL High school league grads Kyla Davis / Ella Boaz took the Women’s Open doubles title.

– Kelly Gremley / Blase Zera took the Mixed Open doubles title.

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Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, and the entire IRTLive crew.

Thanks to the Tourney Director @dan whitley for putting this event on!

Thanks to the Tourney Sponsors KWM Gutterman, Downey Ethics, St. Louis Redbirds, Wood Phillips Patent/Trademark/Copywright attorneys, and

Thurman Brooks – TLBJ CPA Firm.

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

In two weeks, we have US Junior Nationals, to determine the players eligible for the 2026 World Juniors later this year. That will then take us to the end of the 2025-26 season officially. July features Outdoor Nationals, NMRA Nationals. August will feature Mexican Junior Nationals, an IRF regional competition in the DR, and a lower tier IRT event in Costa Rica to kick off the 2026-27 season.

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tags

Welcome to the final event of the 2025-26 IRT season, the 2026 Gateway City Pro am, being held at the Vetta Sports clubs in the St. Louis area. This event takes the place of the postponed US Open, which was initially set to fall on this date but has been pushed a year due to unforeseen circumstances.

St. Louis holds an important spot in the history of our sport. It hosted a number of the early IRA Nationals events (in 1969, 1970, 1973, and 1975). It also was home to a slew of the sport’s early stars, including Marty Hogan, Jerry Hilecher, Steve Serot, Benny Koltun, Doug Cohen, Kenny Wong, Jerry Zuckerman, and the Gross brothers. More recently, StL hosted a decade-long event annually, named the IrtNetwork.com open initially, then Party with the Pros and Winter Rollout.

St. Louis’ High School league remains unique in the country, and the area still churns out hundreds of tournament players per year.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=54042

There are 33 players in the Men’s Pro singles draw, including four St Louis-area top high school players, the entire Guatemalan men’s national team and the entire Costa Rican men’s national team, who make up a bulk of the players seeded 20 and above. This event is the last pro event prior to this summer’s Central America and Caribbean Games event, which every north American country not called USA or Canada is playing.

top20 players missing; unfortunately we got word earlier this week that civil unrest in Bolivia made it impossible for #2 Conrrado Moscoso to get his visa processed in time to make the flight up here. This robs Moscoso of one final pay day for the season, and thins the draw considerably. He and Kane met 8 times this season, but we won’t get a 9th. I suppose i’m thankful that the tour race didn’t get decided by this event, in that Kane’s win a month ago in Montana sewed up the title for the season.

– #2 Moscoso (visa issues)

– #10 Natera

– #17: Carrasco (presumably also visa issues)

– #18, #20: Miranda and Garcia: funding, possibly visa issues (both still live in Bolivia as well)

– #19 Sam Bredenbeck: stepping back

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

In the round of 32:

– Wolfe-Zera in the 16/17 should be close

– US Junior national team member Grant Williams faces down the always tough Jordy Alonso in the first round

– Sneaky good Costa Rican player Gabriel Garcia faces Montoya.

– We get an all-USA Junior U21 matchup between DJ Mendoza and Cole Sendrey, who have together won two straight US Junior national doubles titles together.

– Evan Whitley, son of the tournament director, gets to face #2 Jake Bredenbeck in his pro debut.

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round of 16:

– I like the 8/9 Portillo-Alonso match; that could go either way depending on who’s hot or who is rusty.

– Montoya has to play Gastelum again; last time they played, Diego beat him.

– The red-hot Trujillo plays into the similarly red-hot Jhonathan Flores; this is too early to see this matchup, which on form is at least a quarterfinal match.

– Parrilla faces Martell in a throwback to a decade-old WRT matchup

– An all USA lefty showdown between Manilla and Carter in the bottom half of the draw.

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Projected Qtrs:

– #1 Kane will face the Portillo/Alonso winner. Both have wins over him, but neither will be favored.

– In the 4/5, assuming seeds hold, we get a banger between Flores and Montoya. Two of the hardest hitters on tour could be awesome. Or, we could get a shocker rematch between Gastelum and Trujillo if things don’t fall the way the top seeds want.

– I’m projecting an upset in the 3/6 Acuna-Parrilla match; Parrilla owns a dominant 7-2 h2h lead in my database over Acuna, dating all the way back to a 10U world juniors matchup 20 years ago.

– Another all-USA matchup awaits Jake Bredenbeck, who will face either Manilla or Carter for a semis spot.

Semis:

– Kane vs Flores/Montoya winner; love this match, hope its Kane-Flores, who have met twice in their careers, both being relatively interesting matches to watch.

– Recently married Parrilla shocks the tour with his second upset in a row, beats jake to make the final of the event.

Finals; Kane over Parrilla in a fun contrast in styles.

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Doubles review: There are no Pro doubles this weekend, as the tour is focusing on driving more prize money to the singles draw, making this an IRT-800 event. There will be some solid teams in the Open Doubles draw, which we’ll recap on Monday.

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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. Look for Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, @JTRball, and the IRTLive crew all weekend on the microphone, calling the shots!

Thanks to the Tourney Director @dan whitley for putting this event on!

Thanks to the event sponsors: KWM Gutterman, Downey Ethics, St. Louis Redbirds, Wood Phillips Patent/Trademark/Copywright attorney, and Thurman Brooks – TLBJ CPA Firm.

Thanks to tour sponsors: KWM Gutterman, Papa Nicholas coffee, Black & White Energy drinks, Reignstorm Group; tax and wealth management, Frank Hotels

Gearbox , and Formula Flow.

IRT Club Fantasy: If you’re in the IRT Club, sign up to play Fantasy Racquetball along with myself, Brian Pineda, and other club members. Also, be sure to tune into our Fantasy Fast Break podcast, which we do before and after every IRT Tier 1 event!

Associations

International Racquetball Tour

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend:

– Singles: Kane Waselenchuk

TL/DR Executive Summary: Kane wins the event, his 5th of the season, his 133rd of all time, but more importantly clinches the 2025-26 season ending title for his 16th career pro title. If there was a Mount Rushmore of Racquetball, it would be Kane, Cliff, Sudsy, and Hogan … and Kane now has as many year end titles as the other three legends combined.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=51565

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

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/08ee66

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In the 16s, a couple of monumental upsets

– Diego Gastelum, who has been slowly creeping up the rankings, got a career best win over #5 Rodrigo Montoya, who this pundit had pegged for the semis. (12),12,6 for his first ever win over a top 8 pro.

– Also in this same quadrant, Erick Trujillo continues his rise back up the rankings with a heart-stopping 11-10 win over #4 Andres Acuna. Acuna had match point at 10-4 in the breaker … but skipped a return for the win and then watched as Trujillo came all the way back for the win.

– Mar needed a breaker to over take Thomas Carter, then an ankle injury took him out of the quarters.

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In the Quarters

– #1 Kane handled #9 Manilla 3,9, about what you’d expect at this juncture. Adam is crafty enough to get points but not enough to really press Waselenchuk.

– Trujillo put down Gastelum 11-7 in the third to earn his first career pro semi.

– Flores has to go deep into the breaker to beat Jake 11-8 to advance to his third straight semi-final. Flores is establishing himself as the 3rd best player in the world behind the two top seeds on tour.

– Moscoso got a walkover against Mar … saving some wear and tear on his body for the eventual final against kane.

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In the Semis

– Kane obliterated Trujillo 0,4 in a match that looked for a bit like it may be a double donut in a pro semi.

– Moscoso topped Flores once again, but was pushed as hard as his younger countryman has done so far with an 11-7 breaker.

In the Finals

– Kane wasn’t really troubled throughout, opening up a 12-0 lead in game one. Moscoso, as he normally does, seems to start slow then wake up and pulled the match back to 14-9, but it was too much of a deficit. In game 2, led throughout the early portion of the game, then at the mid way point down 6-8, Kane took over, blitzing Conrrado for a handful of points to take the lead, one which he’d never relinquish. At match point, Kane put away an easy cross court winner for the game, the match, the tournament, and the season title.

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Points Implications of results

As mentioned at the top, and in the previews, Conrrado had to win out to win the title. With this win, Kane has an uncatchable lead … even if he didn’t even show up for the last event of the season. He wins his 16th career pro title at the age of 44, a pretty amazing feat.

Here’s a link to my IRT Rolling 2year Calendar XLS, which I use to approximate the points after each event. In the interests of the race, I have been keeping this artifact exactly matching the top 20-25 players for the season.

men

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1z6eg6NJT6fjGMfRRyKTNLShAiDoz0TzzmQCt1_SbNBo/edit?usp=sharing

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– Subieta beat Veronica Sotomayor in the Men’s Open final.

– Montoya/George topped Natera/Frank in the Men’s Open doubles final.

– Centurian Doubles: Monchik and Frank blitzed the draw for the win.

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Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, Pablo Fajre, and the entire IRTLive crew.

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Next up?

Per our handy master racquetball calendar …

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

No pro events the rest of the month, but we do have Canadian Nationals on Memorial Day weekend. Then in June, each of the IRT and LPRT have season ending events, along with USA Junior Nationals. I’d imagine we’ll ahve Mexican Junior Nationals announced soon (Canada does its Jr. Nats at its May overall national championships).

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tags

International Racquetball Tour

The 2025-26 IRT season is coming to an end, and the competition is heating up for the year-end #1 spot. The second to last event this season is the 2026 Pro Nationals, coming to you from Missoula, Montana. It’s the first time a Tier 1 has ever featured in Montana, and its the return of the venerable “Pro Nationals” title for events for the first time since 2009 in Chicago. Before that, it was a decade-long property run by Mike Coulter out of Las Vegas and was perhaps the 2nd most popular stop on tour for years.

R2 Sports App link: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=51565

23 players made the treck to Montana for the Singles draw; there’s no doubles so it’s win or go home all weekend for the pros.

top20 players missing; #7 Parrilla is still nursing an injury, #10 Lalo had a conflict. #12 Alonso and #14 Martell make it a quartet of top Mexicans missing this draw, and the two leading Argentines (Garcia and Miranda) did not make the long flight.

Many of the Bolivians stuck around for the week in between Los Cab and Montana, with Moscoso & Carrasco staying in California and winning titles at the Paddleball US Open, while others went to San Antonio or Iowa last weekend to compete in minor IRT events.

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

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In the round of 32s,

– we get the sole Montana Resident in this draw Gatlin Sutherland going up against Carrasco in a fun one.

– In the 16/17 matchup we get Blase Zera versus Juan Herrera II for a shot at Kane.

– Canadian vet Lee Connell has a good shot at a main draw.

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round of 16:

– The 8/9 is Manilla vs Natera, should be a good match.

– I like the upset watch for Gastelum vs Montoya, for Trujillo over Acuna, and for Carter against Mar.

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Projected Qtrs:

– Kane vs Manilla in a battle of lefties

– Montoya over Acuna to setup a rematch of Los Cab semis against kane.

– Flores makes it 3 out of 4 this season over Jake

– Moscoso cruises past Mar once again.

Semis: I’m predicting the exact same semis that we saw in Los Cab.

– Kane tops Montoya in a rematch of two weeks ago. Montoya will get his points and make his acrobatic gets, but won’t get a win.

– Moscoso handles his countryman Flores once again.

Finals;

I’m predicting we get Kane vs Conrrado in the finals for the fourth time out of the last five events. They went 11-9 in a 2+ hour marathon in California and should do the same here.

All the marbles are up for grabs here on out: if Kane wins this event or the season finale in St. Louis, he sews up his 16th career pro title. But, if Moscoso wins here it’ll all come down to the potential final in June for who gets the #1.

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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.

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

Thanks to the Tourney Directors Andy Weber for putting this event on!

IRT Club Fantasy: If you’re in the IRT Club, sign up to play Fantasy Racquetball along with myself, Brian Pineda, and other club members. Also, be sure to tune into our Fantasy Fast Break podcast, which we do before and after every IRT Tier 1 event!

Associations

International Racquetball Tou r

Congrats to your Pro winners on the weekend

– Singles: @Kane Waselenchuk

– (there was no Pro doubles this weekend)

TL/DR Executive Summary: Kane breaks his 3-match losing streak to Moscoso in an epic 11-9 final and puts his 16th career year-end title within reach.

R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=51931

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

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/30fb39

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In the 32s, we had just one “upset” and a whole slew of blowouts. In case you’re ever wondering why the tour used to give byes into the round of 16 to its top eight players in lieu of doing pro-ams or sponsor doubles, this is why. Here’s some of the scores of the top seeds in their round of 32 matches:

– 2&1, 1&6, 3&6, 1&3, 1&3, 1&1, 3&8, 4&7, 4&4, 2&2, 6&1

Of course, there were some decent matches in the 32s, but they were in the places one would have expected: the 16/17 and 15/18 seed games, the solid international player who only plays a handful of pro events every year (Salvatierra) and the one involving former tier 1 tour champ making a rare appearance on tour (Pratt).

– Manilla being upset by former tour event winner Charlie Pratt was the biggest result of the round. Manilla goes from beating Moscoso two weeks ago to losing in the 32s, and does a massive amount of damage to his chances of finishing in the top 10 this season.

– Trujillo edged Collins in the 16/17 match 15-13 and 15-13, continuing his “come back” after some time off.

– Carter was pushed by Salvatierra but advanced 10,7 in the only other real upset-watch match of the round.

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In the 16s:

– Pratt continued his run by topping Portillo 12,12. I’m not sure what this says about the state of the tour, though I know what my friend Sudsy Monchik would say…), but when a retired 30-something tour veteran pops in and beats two top 10 players, one has to ask some questions about the depth of talent on tour.

– Mar was pressed heavily by Martell, saving a match point in game two before advancing. (14),14,5. Tough loss for Jaime; when you have match point on your racquet and can’t convert, it can be a tough pill to swallow.

– Acuna was pressed heavily by Gastelum before advancing 11-8 in the third. Great showing for Diego, who continues to incrementally push forward as a pro. He was the 14th seed here, and it seems like just a matter of time before he gets a really big win.

– Flores got a 15-7, inj default win over Carter. The first game was back and forth; i did not see the injury but Flores gets a break in the round.

– Natera spanked Alonso 7,6 to get back to the quarters for just the 3rd time this season. A solid win.

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In the Quarters, I did a second preview video for the tour ahead of the QF round, which hopefully everyone saw. I hope you’re enjoying the previews I’m doing, which I try to make stat-based and interesting.

– #1 Kane ended Pratt’s run in about 15 minutes 15-0, 15-2. In my preview, I surmised Kane would have a tedious, tactical match here against either Portillo or Manilla, neither of whom go down easily … but a 0,2 quarter final result drastically reduces the “load” on the #1 seed, which would come into play heavily in this 2x back-to-back schedule.

– #4 Montoya handled his doubles partner #5 Javier Mar 8,7, as he normally does.

– #3 Acuna hung with #6 Flores for two games, then got wiped out in the breaker 11-0 to fall for the second event in a row to the Bolivian.

– #2 Moscoso cruised past Natera 6,7 to setup a juicy semi final against his countryman.

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In the Semis, we got perhaps the best possible matches we could ask for.

– Kane had the expected back and forth power-hitting battle with Montoya in the first semi, grinding out a 13,9 win. In game one, Rodrigo was up 9-6 at one point before Kane was irked by a call, got fired up, and went on an 8-point run to have game point at 14-9. Montoya got it back and went on a run himself, bringing it back to 13-14 before Kane hit a between-the-legs roll-out off the backwall for 15.

In game 2, a back-and-forth early affair led to Kane dominating the mid-game and building a 4-5 point lead that Rodrigo would never be able to get back, eventually leading to a 15-8 win.

– Moscoso-Flores is a matchup that we’ve seen a few times now; 3 times on tour and at least one additional time we know of in Bolivian Nationals earlier this year. For as exciting as Jhonathan is, and having just gotten his first tour win last month, he’s not really close to beating his Country’s #1 yet, though we saw some signs that he’s getting closer.

Game one featured a huge unanswered run of points from Conrrado to flatter Flores a bit with the final 15-10 score-line, then in Game 2, Flores jumped out to a huge lead (8-1 and then 11-3 at one point), before Moscoso outscored him 11-2 the rest of the way to take game two 15-13 and move on.

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In the Finals, we got an epic battle between the two best players in the sport right now, the sixth time they’ve met since last September, and the third straight time they’ve met in a final. Moscoso had gotten the better of Kane 3 times in a row, a shocking run for a player who usually has his total losses in a season measured on 1-2 fingers.

Game one featured a typical Kane early run before Conrrado came from 3-10 and 4-14 down to pull within 13-14. Kane had multiple attempts to close out the game, but Conrrado kept getting chance after chance and closed the gap. Serving at 13-14 and seemingly on the precipice of pulling a game win from the jaws of defeat, Moscoso made several of the better diving gets I’ve ever seen to extend the point before Kane put the ball away to get back in the box. After a timeout and another back-and-forth, Kane finally secured game one on his 7th attempt.

Game two turned into a blow-out quickly, with a tight early game seeing Moscoso go an a similar run that he did in Game one, though this time he was extending his lead instead of chasing the game. We started to see the California heavy air impact the cement walls in game 2, with the crew toweling things off so the balls were bouncing true. Eventually Moscoso finished off game two 15-7 to setup the tiebreaker.

In the breaker, Moscoso jumped out to a quick 4-0 lead and fans may have been worried that Kane was spent and that we’d see a non-competitive tiebreaker. At 4-0, a weird moment where Kane hit a diving pinch shot back at himself that seemed to hit him as he lay prone on the floor, but Conrrado dove over him whimsically … a play that eventually was ruled a replay. Moscoso didn’t fuss nearly as much as the crowd, but it led to Kane immediately getting back into the game a bit with a couple of quick points.

At 2-5 down, Kane went to work and ran off three quick to tie it at 5. The court conditions seemed to be deteriorating quickly, with frequent towel breaks as the floors and walls needed constant drying off to maintain the integrity of the surfaces. The two went back and forth at 5-5 several times before Kane finally breaks the tie with a ripped forehand winner. It took nearly 15 minutes of clock time to just break the 5-5 tie. Kane jumped out to an 8-6 lead, which Conrrado quickly got back to 8-8. The pair had passed the 2 hour mark at this point, and it was a 3-point match.

Moscoso aced Kane for 9-8 and had the momentum; what a timely ace. Kane left a second serve return way up and Moscoso buried a sitter into the ground for a shoulder-slumping mistake at such a crucial time in the match. At 8-9, Kane hit an amazing lob 2nd serve and buried his third shot for 9-9. He got another poor return off a lob for a kill shot for 10-9 … then went for a jam serve at match point and was assessed a penalty hinder when Moscoso held up on a backhand that may (or may not) have been right into Kane’s torso. It’s the kind of avoidable call that usually isn’t given in the pros, since these guys are jumping over returns half the time, but the ref gave it to Kane’s disbelief.

The next rally ended with a disputed non-called wet ball when Moscoso couldn’t return a tight backhand … not that Kane was going to have any empathy after being on the wrong end of a weak avoidable. After a tense timeout, Kane finished the match with an emphatic drive that the athletic Moscoso, who seemingly was getting everything all day, couldn’t retrieve. 11-9 win for Kane after 2hrs 10minutes, and he deservedly celebrated with both hands held high in exaultation.

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Points Implications of results

Kane’s win extends his lead at the top to nearly 500 points, which (as we’ve explained before) still isn’t nearly as much of a lead as one might think thanks to the 1.5 year “best 10” logic being used. However, the win nearly seals up the title for Kane; At this point Conrrado has to win the last to events to win the title. No ifs, ands, or buts. If Conrrado doesn’t win and Kane makes at least the final in both, it’s game over.

Here’s a link to my IRT 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.

men

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1z6eg6NJT6fjGMfRRyKTNLShAiDoz0TzzmQCt1_SbNBo/edit?usp=sharing

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Open Singles, other notable draws

– In Men’s Open Singles: Trujillo beat Gastelum in the final, a rematch of some round of 32s matches earlier this season. Sendrey and Bredenbeck semis.

– LPRT touring pro Carla Munoz made the finals of Men’s Elite but fell to San Luis Potosi’s Juan Carlos Castillo.

– In Men’s Open Doubles, which was stacked in an event with no IRT Pro doubles, the two veteran IRT pros Collins and Pratt shocked Beltran & Trujillo early, then held on to beat Sendrey & Bredenbeck in the final.

– Brenda Laime & Erica Williams won the Women’s Open Doubles draw.

– Laime teamed with Carlos Ochoa to win the Mixed Open draw for two golds.

Lastly, There was an Outdoor competition alongside the pro event, which featured a slew of top Outdoor players who regularly dot the leader boards of Outdoor Nationals.

– In the Outdoor Doubles Open final, Javier Mar & Patrick Allen took out Danny Lavely & Eduardo Portillo.

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Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, Brian Pineda, Pablo Fajre, and the entire IRTLive crew.

Thanks to the Tourney Director Jerry Hall and Rocky Carson for putting this event on!

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

Next weekend, Los Cab hosts the Paddleball US Open, a crossover event that draws many familiar names from the racquetball world. There’s also going to be an IRT U21 event at the Battle of the Alamo in San Antonio and an IRT-150 event in Des Moines. The first weekend of May features the return of Pro Nationals in Montana.

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@iInternational Racquetball Tour

Hello Racquetball fans.

I’m a little late pushing out a “preview” thanks to a busy travel week of sports coverage … and of course the tournament started yesterday, so here’s a quick one to serve as a placeholder for the preview/recap links that I embed into each event.

I’ll use the notes that I created to drive the new preview video that i recorded that will be played at the beginning of some of the matches. You may have seen it: it’s just me chatting into the camera for a few minutes, introducing the event, the sponsors, recapping where we area in the season, calling out some fun early matches, and then giving some predictions.

Here we go:

IRT Preview

1. First off, Thanks to tourney director Jerry Hall and tourney host Rocky Carson. They’ve brought the IRT back to Los Cab after many, many years away.

2. Sponsors: thanks as always to the event and tour sponsors:

Event Sponsors

Los Cab

Carson Fitness

Gold Sponsors: KRP Rentals & Trucks, Sunny Cali Ranch, Bristol Warner marketplace, LA Legal Services

SI Events

Tour sponsors:

KWM Gutterman

Reignstorm Group

Papa Nicholas coffee

Black & White Roofing

Frank Hotels

3. Quick Recap of the most previews event in Chicago: Flores wins becomes 47th ever winner in history of tour. Wins in just his 11th career pro event. He immediately becomes a force to be reckoned with on tour going forward, having shown that he’s going to be favored now against every opponent not named Kane or Conrrado.

4. Set the stage: This week we’re missing Jake Bredenbeck #3, Andree Parrilla #5 which elevates Flores to #6 seed. That eases his pathway into the semis, since he plays into #3 Acuna who he just beat handily in Chicago.

5. Tour race update: Moscoso was upset early in Chicago, but so was Kane, so the race is still on. We lost a planned tier 1 in KC, but the tour has now added an IRT-800 event in StL the weekend the US Open was set to play, so there’s still time.

While an 800 complicates the points calculations a bit, Here’s where things stand. Basically if Moscoso wins 2 of the 3 remaining events and makes the final of the third, he can sew up the title. If Kane wins twice he’ll easily sew things up. Any other combination of events (if either loses early again), then we’re back to the drawing board. Suffice it to say, neither player has it in the bag and there’s a lot to play for at each of the remaining 3 events.

6. Projected matches to watch for this weekend

32s: Manilla/Pratt, Carter-Salvatierra, Bredenbeck-Sendrey

16s: Acuna-Gastelum, Natera-Alonso, Mar-Martell, Portillo-Manilla

7. Predictions: with a Saturday finish, the players have to play twice on both fri and sat, which could make the difference here.

Just looking at the worst case scenario for the two top seeds:

– Kane: Trujillo and Portillo/Manilla on Friday, Montoya/Moscoso Sat

– Moscoso: Bredenbeck and Natera/Alonso Friday, Flores/Kane sat.

Both those are super tough pathways to the title. So, it’s anyone’s game. On the Fantasy Fastbreak podcast I predicted that the Saturday finish would conspire against the 44-yr old Kane a bit, as would the concrete courts and the opponents he has to face down, and gave the edge to Moscoso here. But, Moscoso has to play Flores in the semis, which is going to be a very tough out.

Tune in this weekend as Carrie Reitmeier, Favio Soto, Brian Pineda and perhaps some guest stars will be broadcasting all weekend in this Singles-only event.