Category: Singles

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World Games 2022 Wrap-Up

Acuna with the big win! Photo US Open 2019 Kevin Savory


Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

  • Men’s Singles: Andres Acuna
  • Women’s Singles: Paola Longoria


    A fantastic result for Acuna, who wins his first major title of any kind, and he beat a number of solid players to do so. Meanwhile, Longoria crushed the draw absent of her two closest rivals to take her third straight World Games title.
    Click here for the list of all World Games Quarters/Semis/Finals from 1981 to present, Men’s Open: https://rball.pro/9xe
    Same for Women’s Open: https://rball.pro/edc
    R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39815
    Interesting tournament notes: for one of the few times that i can recall … we could not get live streaming for part of the tournament due to sport ownership/broadcast licensing issues. We’re so used to free streaming on FB that it was a shock to the system of most viewers when we found out that the broadcast rights were exclusive to … someone else for the Semis and finals. CBS Sports? Olympic Channel? It was not clear at the time of the match. Eventually we found that the semis were broadcasting live on the Olympic channel’s youtube feed … would have been nice to have the IRF actually tell us that.
    Then, in an apparent massive gaffe, the two semis ran so far over on time (gee, thought rally scoring was supposed to solve that!) that the professional broadcast team left, meaning no streaming or recording of the final? That seems inexplicable. Lets just hope we actually see these matches on a CBS sports network TV feed or somewhere in the future. Since that was kind of the whole point of standing up the portable court in the first place.

Lets review the notable matches in the Men’s Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/2il

In the 16s, because of the nature of this format, there were mostly blowouts. Only a couple of the opening matches were legitimately competitive:

  • in the 8/9 match, Argentina’s @Diego Garcia got a game off of @RoRodrigo Montoya but couldn’t push it any further, losing in four.
  • In the 7/10 match, Guatemalan #1 @JuJuan Jose Salvatierra took a very, very close 3-game win from Costa Rican @Felipe Camacho 14,14,13.
  • – #13 Canadian @Lee Lee Connell , who got into this event just in the last week, pushed #4 Jake Bredenbeck in a couple of games but fell in three straight.

In the Quarters, some major upsets.

  • #9 Montoya took out a visibly fatigued #1 Landa in four. Landa reportedly was ill heading into the tournament, and looked fatigued on longer rallies throughout the match. Montoya’s power and retrieving was on full display, and he ground down Landa over the course of four games.
  • #5 Parrilla “upset” #4 Jake in three, though this was certainly not an upset by IRT rankings.
  • #3 Mercado handled the tough Ecuadorian #1 Ugalde in three straight.
  • – #2 Acuna took care of business against hte Guatemalan #1 Salvatierra in three.

In the Semis, we got two solid matches with predictable results:

  • Despite Parrilla being #2 in the world, his bugabu is Montoya. Rodrigo improves to 6-3 in post-Junior results against Parrilla, taking him out in four.
  • Acuna solidly advanced past the dangerous Mercado in four to secure his third straight IRF men’s singles final.
  • In the Finals, Acuna won three close games 12,13,14 to take the title. Not that anyone could see it.

Lets review the notable matches in the Women’s Singles draw.
Singles Match report in the PRS database: https://rball.pro/z7x
In the 16s, as with the Men, only a couple of matches were really close:

  • in the 8/9, two LPRT foes squared off with Chilean @Carla Munoz holding off Guatemalan Maria Renee Rodriguez in four games.
  • – In the 7/10, Two LPRT veterans faced off for the 20th time in their careers, with Mexico’s @Samanatha Salas taking out @AmaCris Amaya in three.

The quarters saw some solid action:

  • #1 Longoria handled #9 Munoz in three
  • #5 Barrios got a really solid win against #4 Mendez, winning in four games. This portends well for Angelica’s attempts to move up in the LPRT standings, if she can get a win against the current #4 ranked player.
  • #6 Gaby made fast work of #3 Rajsich 8,9,8, another “upset” by seed but certainly not by current LPRT ranks.
  • In the best match of the quarters, and the only match so far to go five games, #7 Salas upset #2 Lawrence in a great comeback. Lawrence was up 2 games to 1, but Salas dominated the 4th to force the tiebreaker, which she took 11-9.
    No Americans into the semis on home soil.
    In the Semis:
  • Longoria won a straightforward, if slightly closer than you may have expected, semi over Bolivia’s Barrios 12,12,9.
  • Gaby took down the red-hot Salas in four games to setup a rematch of the 2018 Worlds final against Paola.
  • In the final, Paola came out on fire to win the first game 15-2 before Gaby pulled back one for respectability. From there, Paola ground out the expected win to take her 3rd straight title.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from primary broadcasters Gary Mazaroff and Alexis Iwaasa, your lead broadcasters. Thanks to the IRT crew (@Pablo Fajre) for heading to Birmingham to setup the streaming equipment; it looked fantastic all weekend.
A comment on the streaming: once the Olympic channel people got in, with their million dollar equipment and high-bandwidth capabilities … man did the sport look good. From here on out, I’ll be using what we saw on youtube as my defacto response to people who ignorantly claim that hte sport is “too fast to broadcast.” No it isn’t; you just need the right equipment.

An additional observation: perhaps we should have re-thought the qualification for this event. The top 4 racquetball playing countries are USA, Mexico, Canada, and Bolivia. You know who was not here on the Men’s side competing? All four of the current reigning champions from these four countries. Carson, De La Rosa, Murray, and Moscoso. It was only half as bad on the female side, with Manilla (USA current champ) and Lambert (Canadian champ) not here. If this is the biggest showcase the sport has had in decades (when was the last time the IOC president showed up to watch Racquetball??), if it was worth the tens of thousands of dollars of expenditure for a MASSIVE IRF staff, a slew of referees, the portable court, etc … maybe we should have had our best players there? The round of 16 was an abomination as compared to what we see day in and day out on the pro tour, and less than half the current pro top 10 on either side competed. Opportunity Lost.

Thanks to @BoBob Frazer and all the staff who helped setup and breakdown the portable court; it looked amazing and the setup was awesome.

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.

Next up?
Per our handy master racquetball calendar …
https://docs.google.com/…/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMb…/
Outdoor Nationals 2022 is this weekend! Its the second outdoor major of the year, the second leg of the Outdoor Cup series, and one of the longest running tournaments in our sport.

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2022 World Games Preview

Kelani is the #2 seed in Birmingham. Photo USAR Singles 2019 via Kevin Savory


We have a rather unique tournament coming up this weekend; its the Racquetball Component of the World Games.
The World Games is a sporting event comprised of sporting disciplines that are NOT competed in the Olympics. Its meant to be the Olympics of non-Olympic sports. And that certainly includes our sport, which endeavored for decades to try to get into the Olympics and never succeeded.
The first World Games was held in 1981 in Santa Clara, CA. Racquetball as a sport used this platform as a way to initiate our own version of an international championship, therefore we also called the 1981 event the first ever IRF “Worlds” Six countries sent players (USA, Mexico, Japan, German, Ireland, and the Netherlands, but curiously not Canada, the 2nd biggest playing country at the time) and the tournament was not surprisingly dominated by American players. The top 3 Men’s and Women’s seeds at the event were all team USA, and the finals were both all USA affairs.
On the Men’s side in 1981, #1 seed @Ed Andrews defeated #3 @Mark Martino 15,18 to win the inaugural title. On the Women’s side in 1981, #1 seed @Cindy Baxter defeated #2 @Barbara Faulkenberry 6,(18),2 in the final (games back then were played to 21). Both Andrews and Baxter are now enshrined in the USAR Hall of Fame.

  • Click here for the Match Report from the 1981 World Games Men’s Open: https://rball.pro/4nn
  • And click here for the Women’s Open: https://rball.pro/bvd
    Since 1981, the World Games have been held every four years in spots rotating around the world … but the Racquetball component has not always been present. In 1985 future IRT star @AAndy Robert topped long-time Canadian #1 @Roger Harripersad in the final, while Baxter repeated as champion, topping Canadian Carol Dupuy in the final.
    However, the racquetball component was cancelled in multiple World Games events in the 80s and 90s due to the selection of sites with no racquetball courts. In Germany in 1989, in Finland in 1997, Japan 2001, and Germany 2005 all cancelled the racquetball components. In fact, the most recent World games from 2017 also cancelled racquetball when Poland couldn’t get the budget to build new courts. So, since 1981 there’s been just five events played …. and 2022 will be the sixth.
  • Click here for a full list of World Games Men’s Open finals: https://rball.pro/2ig
  • And click here for the full list of Women’s Games Women’s finals: https://rball.pro/tjb
    In 2022, @Paola Longoria has a chance to win her 3rd ever World Games title; she was the winner in 2009 over Rajsich and in 2013 over Amaya; all three of these players will be competing at the 2022 event.

Meanwhile on the Men’s side, the last winner of the World games in 2013 was @Polo Gutierrez, who defeated his countryman @Gilberto Mejia in the final 11-10 . Both these players retired from full-time play years ago, so we’ll definitely have a new champion this time around.

Here’s a preview of the 2022 event. We waited until the day of the event since the draws were just released. They’re also on R2 here:
https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39815
The 16 Qualifiers on each side were determined by their exact finish at the 2021 IRF World games. The top 12 by all non-European/Asian countries, then the last 4 spots reserved for Europe and Asia’s top qualifiers.
However, on both the Men’s and Women’s side we did see some qualifiers decline the invites, and thus we had to go to the 13th and higher placing players to fill this event. They slotted into the seeding ahead of the European/Asian players in the draw. Here’s the replacement players:

  • #4 Moscoso was replaced by the 17th place finisher Cueva from 2021 Worlds, and Cueva slots into the #11 seed here.
  • #12 Manzuri was replaced by the #18 finisher from the DR Ramon De Leon; he becomes the #12 seed here.
  • Korea’s auto qualifier Mingyu declined to come, so the organizers went on down the line form Worlds and ended up with Canada’s Lee Connell, who slots into the #13 seed here.
  • Just one woman qualifier declined to come; that being the quite-pregnant Vargas; she is replaced by the 13th place finisher from Worlds, Bolivian junior @MMicaela Menese
    Unfortunately … they only have time for a single-elimination draw. So all these players are flying in for a one-and done draw. So tensions will be high. Here’s my preview:
    On the Men’s side, here’s how I see the competition going. round of 16:
  • #1 Alejandro Landa faces Ireland’s #2 @Eoin Tynan.
  • #2 @Andres Acuna faces South Korea’s #2 @LeeGunhee Lee
  • #3 Mario Mercado takes on Ireland #2 Ken Cottrell
  • #4 @Jake Bredenbeck , who gets the bump up with Moscoso’s absence (as well as everyone else here on down), now faces Canadian Connell in the opener.
  • #5 @Andree Parrilla will take on the DR’s De Leon in the opener.
  • #6 Ugalde will take on Cueva in a ridiculous situation where two players from the same country are flying thousands of miles to play a one-and-done tournament against each other.
  • #7 An interesting Latin American battle between Guatemala’s #1 Salvatierra and former IRT touring pro Costa Rican Camacho.
  • In the best match of the opener, Bolivian turned Argentinian Diego Garcia takes on the vastly under-seeded former Pan Am Games/World champion @Rodrigo Montoya. I like Garcia’s game, but Montoya should move on here.
    As you’re about to see, the seedings will end up giving us finals-quality matchups in the quarters. If I was re-seeding this event from scratch i’d probably go Landa, Parrilla, Montoya, Acuna, Mercado, Bredenbeck, Garcia, and then probably Camacho.
    Quarters preview:
  • #1 Landa vs #9 Montoya: Well, on paper this is a projected win for Landa. Landa is on “home” soil as the USA rep. However, Montoya always plays well internationally and has proven he can beat Landa time and again in their careers. I think this is going to be close, but Landa pulls it out in a 5th game thriller. Would not be surprised in the least if Montoya wins.
  • 4/5 Parrilla vs Bredenbeck: a tough draw for Jake, pulling the now-#2 ranked IRT player in Parrilla. Andree moves on.
  • 3/6 Mercado will take out the surviving Ecuadorian winner of Ugalde/Cueva.
  • #2 Acuna likely faces his countryman Camacho, who he’s played a thousand times before. Acuna should move on.
    Semis:
  • #5 Parrilla over #1 Landa: I think Parrilla has the confidence and the game to take out Landa at this juncture. However, if this is Montoya and not Landa … watch out for a very competitive coin-flip of a match.
  • #2 Acuna over #3 Mercado: these two faced off in the semis of 2021 Worlds, a fascinating 11-9 thriller taken by the up and coming Acuna. I think the result goes the same.

Final: Parrilla over Acuna. Acuna’s game has taken light year steps forward in the last two years, but Parrilla is the better player

Women’s preview:
The round of 16 for the women will give us a couple of fun matches.

  • #1 Longoria over Japan’s Hanashi
  • #9 Munoz over #8 MRR: these two LPRT regulars have met a few times over the years and Munoz has never lost.
  • #5 Barrios vs #12 Meneses: both the Bolivians meet in the first. A real bummer for the junior, who got in as a “lucky loser” but now will go down in the first to a player she plays a lot back home but cannot yet beat.
  • #4 Mendez over Korea’s Lee
  • #3 Rajsich vs #14 Hickey. This should be a win for Rhonda … but Hickey can play.
  • #6 Gaby Martinez should advance over #11 Canadian Morisette.
  • #7 Salas over long-time rival #10 Amaya
  • #2 Lawrence should advance over Ireland’s Haverty.
    In the quarters:
  • #1 Longoria is 18-0 over Munoz for their career and will make it 19-0. Carla will push for some points to make it close.
  • #5 Barrios over #4 Mendez: these two are 1-1 career, but Barrios took their last meeting on the pro tour. I like Barrios in rally scoring; she defends well and gets sneaky points.
  • #6 Gaby over #3 Rhonda: seedings aside, Gaby is one of the top women in the world right now and should advance past Rhonda, even though Rhonda always plays well internationally.
  • #2 Lawrence will have her hands full with #7 Salas; this could be an upset in the making here. They’ve only played twice, both dominant Salas wins, but they were both prior to 2020 when Samantha’s game took a downturn and Kelani stepped up. This will be a fascinating match. Salas got a ton of solid wins to make the semis in the KC Super max … can she continue that trend? Salas in 5.
    Semis:
  • #1 Longoria is unstoppable and will dominate Barrios to move to the final.
  • If Salas advances … she just beat Gaby in KC, and beat her handily 5,12. If Kelani ekes it out in the quarters, she’s never beaten Gaby. So its a hard one to predict. I’m going to go Salas in a continuation of her current form, making the finals.

Finals: Longoria tops her long-time doubles partner and rival Salas to win her 3rd straight World Games.

Follow IRF and IRT on Facebook for streaming: they’ll be doing early rounds. Its unclear what happens for the latter rounds; it may be on the IOC feed or somewhere else.
Looking forward to some international racquetball!

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USAR Junior Nationals wrap-up

Annie Roberts captured the first ever Girls 21U singles title. Photo 2019 Jr Nats via Kevin Savory


r2sports home page for all the brackets:
https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39341


Congrats to your @USA Racquetball Junior National winners on the weekend. Champions were crowned in singles, doubles, and mixed doubles for six age groups on the weekend, so lots of champions to recognize.


This post is official notification that we’ve added the data to the database at www.proracquetballstats.com . This is the first time we’ve had a 21U junior division, so we’ve also made a bunch of coding changes to the behavior of the site. Please let us know if you see any issues or cannot see data as expected.

A reminder on our data entry policies for juniors: we put in full brackets for 14+ and older divisions, just the finalists for younger divisions, and just the finalists for doubles.
The finalists of each Singles division and the Champions of each Doubles division qualify for the US Junior National team, and have first right of refusal to compete at Worlds in November.
Singles

  • Boys 21U: Micah Farmer
  • Boys 18U: Josh Shea
  • Boys 16U: Nikhil Prasad
  • Boys 14U: Nathan Rykus
  • Boys 12U: Vaishant Mangalampalli
  • Boys 10U: Noah Jakola
  • Girls 21U: Annie Roberts
  • Girls 18U: Heather Mahoney
  • Girls 16U: Naomi Ros
  • Girls 14U: Andrea Perez-Picon
  • Girls 12U: Aarya Shetty
    Boys/Girls Doubles
  • Boys 21U: Assuan Castaneda & Micah Farmer
  • Boys 18U: Josh Shea & Paul Saraceno
  • Boys 16U: Gatlin Sutherland & Nikhil Prasad
  • Boys 14U: Eshan Ali & Nathan Rykhus
  • Boys 12U: Lucas Frost-Biskup & Vaishant Mangalampalli
  • Girls 21U: Graci Wargo & Shane Diaz
  • Girls 18U: Heather Mahoney & Julia Stein
  • Girls 16U: Ava Kaiser & Naomi Ros
  • Girls 14U: Aarya Shetty & Sarah Bawa
    Mixed Doubles
  • Mixed 21U: Shane Diaz & Micah Farmer
  • Mixed 18U: Heather Mahoney & Timmy Hansen
  • Mixed 16U: Naomi Ros & Cole Sendrey
  • Mixed 14U: Montserrat Torres & Axel Lopez
  • Mixed 12U: Aarya Shetty & Vaishant Mangalampalli

The best ways to see all the winners in one place are via the Junior Matrix Reports at the website.
Click here: https://rball.pro/mey for the Boys Junior winner’s matrix for all USA junior titles, dating back to 1974.
Click here: https://rball.pro/cpf for the same report for the Girls.

However, for each of the singles draws you can see all the match results by pulling down the event at the main Junior home page. Go here, then hit the event pulldown: http://rb.gy/rnps1f

Here’s some commentary on the Boys singles divisions one by one.
Boys 21U: Micah Farmer held serve as the #1 seed and held off #4 Castenada in a 5-gamer in the semis and then Elkins in the final for the win.
Boys 18U came down to #1 vs #2 as predicted, and they played a barn burner. NY’s Josh Shea cruised to the first two games to make it look like it’d be laugher, but defending champ @Timmy Hansen took the next two to force the 5th. There, Shea ground out an 11-7 win for his first Junior National title.
Boys 16U came down to 1v2 in the final, and #1 Nikhil Prasad had to come back from 2-1 games down to secure the title over #2 @Gatlin Sunderland. Prasad repeats as 16U champ and secures his 7th career junior national singles title.
Boys 14U has a new titlist, as #2 Nathan Rykhus moved up from 12U and defeated the defending champion #1 Eshan Ali in a 5-game barn burner. This is Rykhus’ third junior singles title, and interestingly his 3rd in a row in new age groups.
Boys 12U was 1v2 in the final, with Fremont’s Vaishant Mangalampalli taking his first junior national title over #2 seed Alejandro Robles Pico.

Boys 10Udb’s RR group was taken by Texan Noah Jakola. Fellow Texan Fernando Miguel Carpena finished 2nd.

Here’s some thoughts on the Girls Singles draws:
Girls 21U: @Annie Roberts took the solid RR group, with wins over fellow LPRT part timers like Diaz, Wargo, and Perez-Picon. Solid win.
Girls 18U Heather Mahoney returned to the winner’s circle, topping #2 Julia Stein in the final to secure her 9th Junior National title and her first since 2019. She can’t reach the all-time record for junior titles by a US Female (@Adrienne Haynes with 11) but she can get close with one more 18U title.
Girls 16U was taken by #1 @Naomi Ros to repeat as 16U titlist. She topped #2 Ava Kaiser in the final. Ros now holds 2 US junior national titles and at least 2 Mexican Junior National titles in younger ages (our records are incomplete).
Girls 14U was taken by #1 Andrea Perez-Picon in dominant fashion, without dropping a game. She secures her 6th US Junior National title and has a chance at the all-time record if she can run the table here on out.
Girls 12U was taken by Arya Shetty, who won the 4-person RR.
Girls 10U was won by Anum Mitha, who topped Anna Sikorski h2h for the title.

Girls 14U

We also capture Junior Doubles data, but only the winners of the draws going back in time.
https://rball.pro/o0y

Click on the PRS home page for Junior Doubles results and you can pull up winners by division.

Congrats to all the new members of the Junior National team. They qualify to represent the US at World Juniors in November, which apparently will be at the new facility in Guatemala City (though the IRF has not officially announced the site).

Thanks to @Connor Shane for running the event, thanks to Leo Vazquez for streaming and broadcasting all weekend.

Next up?
Per our handy master racquetball calendar …
https://docs.google.com/…/1V6OTid6rZ356voXVkoV2sN7KMMb…/
Next up on the Racquetball calendar is a break for the 4th of July weekend, then the World Games happen in Birmingham from 7/10 to 7/13, then the big Outdoor Nationals happens in Huntington Beach!

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USA Racquetball Junior Nationals Preview

Timmy Hansen goes for a repeat in boys 18U. Photo unk source


We’re back on the US National tournament circuit, a month past May’s Singles and Doubles, and this time we’re in Des Moines, IA for the 48th annual @USA Racquetball Junior Nationals tournament. First held in 1974 in San Diego, the first Boys 18U winner was one Jerry Zuckerman, who went on to play in 39 pro events throughout the 1970s. The second ever junior nationals 18U division was won by none other than @Marty Hogan , who of course would go on to quickly start adding Pro titles to his resume and who changed the course of the sport. The Girls didn’t start having divisions until 1978, and the first Girls 18U champ was Lislie Lindskog.
101 participants are in Iowa this weekend, a nice improvement over last year’s junior turnout, and they’re in for a ton of racquetball.
R2sports link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39341

Click here for Junior matrix Reports which show every winner for every year in one place:

  • Boys US Junior National champs: http://rb.gy/pju5me
  • Girls US junior national champs: http://rb.gy/lucca0
    Junior tournaments are like previewing 20 individual tournaments, since you’re talking about multiple age group draws, so here’s a few words about each of the singles draws:
    Boys 21U: The relatively new 21U division has 7 players playing it, headlined by #1 seed Micah Farmer. I suspect it will be an upset if Farmer doesn’t take it.
    Boys 18U features four names familiar to most pro rball fans; #1 seed Timmy Hansen (son of Hall of Famer Tim Hansen), #2 seed New Yorker Josh Shea , #3 seed lefty Iowa’n @AnAndrew Gleason , and #4 seed Texan @D.J. Mendoza. All four are periodic IRT players and the semis should be excellent. Hansen is the defending champ but I think Shea is the favorite to win this.
    Boys 16U is headlined by the defending champ @Nikhil Prasad , who already has 6 Junior National titles and is an overwhelming favorite here. But there’s a huge draw with a ton of challengers here. #2 @Gatlin Sunderland was a semi finalist in 16U last year, #6 Mendoza is competing in both 16U and 18U and could be a dark horse, and #5 @Benjamin Horne made the quarters of 18U last year as a 15yr old. Lots of fun here.
    Boys 14U: The #1 seed is last year’s champ Eshan Ali, but he’ll be challenged by last year’s 12U champ and fellow Northern California player #2 Nathan Ryhkus to repeat and claim his 5th junior national title.
    Boys12U’s will have a new champ, with Ryhkus moving up. Last year’s 10U champ Alejandro Robles-Pincon is the #2 seed and a favorite, projected to face #1 seed Vaishant Mangalampalli if seeds hold.

Boys 10U Double Bounce returns for the first time since 2019, with four new-comers set to compete. No other younger groups (8U, 8Umb, 6U) are being competed this year.

Girls 21U will be a fun one, with a few LPRT regulars entered along with a couple of newer names that could surprise. Graci Wargo , @Annie Roberts, @Shane Diaz, and @Estefania Perez-Picon have all featured on the pro tour this season, and watching these up and coming American’s compete here will be great experience. My money is Roberts 1, Diaz 2, Perez-Picon 3.
Girls 18U features a full 16 player draw, headlined by 8-time US Junior champ @Heather Mahoney as the #1 seed. #2 is @Julia Stein, a veteran junior player who won 10U in 2013. The rest of the draw is filled with veterans of High School nationals, with 10 players hailing from the St. Louis league.
Girls 16U’s draw is headlined by its defending champ @Naomi Ros, who also happens to have played in half the LPRT events this year. She took the 16U final last year over #2 seed @Ava Kaiser … so hard not to predict a rematch there. Ros won a couple of Mexican Junior national titles before moving here in 2020, and now is set to compete for the US for the forseeable future. Watch out though for the #3 and #4 seeds: Sonya Shetty has 3 junior national titles herself, and Andrea Perez-Picon is no stranger to the pro tour herself (and the 14U finalist to Shetty last year). Tough semis and finals here.

Girls 14U: #1 Andrea Perez-Picon is in the driver’s seat here, the finalist last year and also reigning 12U champ.

There’s also both gender doubles and Mixed doubles this weekend, with many players competing in all three. The 18U doubles tournaments in particular look great, and I hope we get to see some streaming.
Leo Vazquez is back on the USAR mike this weekend; follow USAR and sign up for live stream notifications all weekend.

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LPRT 2021-22 Season ending Standings and Season Wrap-up Part 3: Select players ranked 21 and higher

Meneses finished just outside the top 20; how will she fare next season? Photo Severna park 2021 via Ken Fife

We recapped the top 10 LPRT finishers first, then the players ranked 11th-20th, now here’s some commentary on the players who finished 21st or higher. This will be a selection of the players; I’m not going to write up every player from 21-60+. We’ll focus on the notables, regular tour players, and the like.

  • #21: Michaela Meneses the 18U reigning world junior champ from Bolivia, came in ranked #21 after showing some impressive results early in the season. She had wins over Lotts, MRR, and Enriquez. But then she collapsed at season’s end, losing multiple matches by donut scores (or close to it). Apparently she’s going through some swing mechanical changes, and should recover for the beginning of the next pro season and in time for her to defend her 18U title. She’s got promise, can hang with seasoned players, and looks like a future top10 Bolivian star like Barrios and Centellas before her.
    Projected Rank next season: 15-16 range.
  • #23 Jenny Daza only played 3 events, but upset C.Munoz and got a walkover against Parrilla to get to the Vero Beach quarters. A couple of years ago she beat Vargas at the US Open. She can get solid wins … but lives 4,000 miles away and cannot travel to every stop. So, she’ll remain a player to watch out for when she plays.
    Projected Rank next season: mid 20s.

24 Veronica Sotomayor recently relocated to the US, living in Vero Beach, and made it to three events. She’s a former top 10 ranked player who just turned 30 and who trains every day with one of the best players who ever lived in husband @Sudsy Monchik , and can still play. She’s a threat whenever she plays, but cannot commit to playing full time. She’ll remain the wildcard “player nobody wants to have feed into them” in draws she enters, and she’ll hope to pick off wins here and there.

Projected Rank next season: low-to-mid 20s unless she decides to commit to the tour full time, then we’re talking top 10.

  • #27 @Annie Roberts is in college now, matriculated from juniors, and keeps running into Laime in pro draws (her last three round of 32 matches were all against the Colombian). She continues to show power improvements, and she’s eventually going to play someone besides Brenda to get a shot at a round of 16 matchup against a top 8 seed. Her college commitments will keep her from touring full time presumably, meaning her rank will remain in the 20s.
    Projected Rank next season: mid 20s.
  • #27 Susy Acosta played the tour about half-time, which is what she’s basically done since turning 40, but continues to compete. This was her 24th season with pro results and her lefty-ness will continue to get her partners in the doubles side for some time to come.
    Projected Rank next season: upper 20s.
  • #29 Naomi Ros is one to keep an eye on; she’s the reigning US 16U junior national champ, meaning she’s still got two years of junior racquetball remaining, but is already making half the LPRT events now that she’s relocated from Mexico to south Texas. She’s still looking for a signature pro win, but has hung with veterans and it’s just a matter of time before she starts getting wins.
    Projected rank next season: low to mid 20s.

36 @Daniela Rico is another 18u junior who can put some good results on the board; she only played a couple of LPRT events this year (going one-and done in Vero Beach and Boston) but made the semis of 18U world juniors and put a loss on a very under-rated Lucia Gonzalez at Mexican Nationals earlier this year. Another in a long line of Mexican junior women to watch going forward.

Projected rank: still mid 30s.

37 Ireland’s @Aisling Hickey made some noise in a couple of events she entered and has relocated to California, which could open up a pathway for her to play more events. We’ll see; we didn’t see her in any of the spring events, so perhaps moving to the US wasn’t the springboard for her to play m ore LPRT events.

Projected rank next season: low-to-mid 30s.

43 @martina Katz made her pro debut at the season’s final event; she’s an Argentine 18U champ who could start to feature for the Argentinian national team soon.

Projected rank next season: 30s-40s.

Phew, that’s it for recapping the season! One more post after this to point out some milestones I tracked on the “tour history page” as a look back at the season that was.

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LPRT 2021-22 Season ending Standings and Season Wrap-up Part 2: the 11-20 ranked players

We recapped the top 10 LPRT finishers first in a post from last Friday. Now here’s some commentary on the players who finished 11-20.

11 @Carla Munoz finished 11th on season, pipped for the top 10 by just 30 points (by way of comparison; LPRT players get 25 points for making the round of 16 in a regular tier 1 event. Munoz had some unlucky early round matchups (a round of 32 meeting with Scott at the US Open and a tough loss in the 32s to Jenny Daza in Vero Beach), but also had some really solid wins on the season (defeats of Salas, Centellas, Vargas, and Manilla). She’s definitely poised to rocket into the top 10 if she can replace a US Open round of 32 loss with a better finish later this year.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #9/#10; i think she can gain a little ground on the players just ahead of her.

12: Kelani Lawrence comes in 12th, her career best. She’s incrementally improved her pro ranking each season she’s played the tour full time, moving from 22nd, to 15th, to 12th. She missed out on #11 by just 5 ranking points; just one more result puts her in the top 10. Lawrence made her first pro semi this season and had marquee wins over Mendez and Vargas.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #9/#10: I can see her competing with Munoz for that last top 10 spot.

13: Brenda Laime Jalil came in 13th, right in line where she’s been ranked for the past few seasons. She made 4 quarters and missed 2 events; those two events cost her a top 10 spot this season. What’s interesting about Laime this season is her results: she had a number of big wins: Mejia, Herrera, and Parrilla. She definitely has the capability of moving into the top 10.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: Just outside top 10; perhaps increasing a couple of slots until she shows she can play 100% of events.

14: Samantha Salas Solis saw her ranking slip to the lowest point of her career in an non-injury season. She missed a few events but had a massive showing in Kansas City, making her sole semi of the season and topping both Mendez and Gaby. So the talent is still there; she just needs to focus it at the right times to get back to her lofty ranking of yesteryear.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #10-#11: Her rank now has her running into top 4 players in the 16s, and that’s gonna make it tough for her to get back into the top 10.

15: Valeria Centellas has definitely taken a tumble from her top 10 ranking two seasons ago; she just cannot repeat her international success on the tour. Her best win on tour this year was over Rhonda … but Rhonda also beat her twice at the same tournament junctures (round of 16).

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #14-15: around the same as this year, unless she can make some major changes to her game.

16: @Hollie Scott improves her year end ranking for the 5th successive season and really her first playing the tour full time. She had some solid wins and didn’t take any “bad” losses, so I can see her moving up.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: Just outside the top 10, in the 10-12 range.

17: @MarMaria Renee Rodriguez finished in basically the same spot she has finished the last three years running. She’s consistently getting to the round of 16, but no further (which is in line with finishing 17th on tour). She needs some marquee wins over top10 players to get much further up the rankings.

Predicted Rank next season: same range, #16-#17.

18: @Sheryl Lotts’ season is a lot like MRRs: her results split between round of 16 and round of 32 losses. Perhaps her best win of the season was a h2h meeting with MRR in the most recent event (in the 16/17 round of 32 match), which inevitably led to a round of 16 loss to top-seeded Longoria. Lotts has been in this range for a bit now, and it is hard to get out of without a shock upset win.

Predicted Rank next season: #16-#17 range along with MRR.

19: @Nancy Enriquez has been seeing her ranking fall year after year for 5 years now. She seems to be stepping back a bit from touring, missing 3 events this season, which has contributed to her ranking fall. When she has played, she’s taking early round losses (3 round of 32 upsets). It looks like she may continue to step back.

Predicted Rank next season: Mid 20s.

20: Cristina Amaya Cris Amaya ‘s ranking has fallen to a career low 20th, thanks in part to her missing three events on the season. When she has played though, she has made the 16s (4 of her 6 tournaments saw her advance to the 16s), and she’s not terribly removed from a time when she was making the quarters on a regular basis. She needs to get healthy and commit to the tour full time to turn things around.

Predicted Rank next season: #13-15 range if she plays full time.

In part 3 we’ll cover the rest of the tour, those of note who finished ranked in the 20s or further down.

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IRT Costa Rica Open Recap

Parrilla gets the double this weekend in San Jose. Photo 2019 US Open via Kevin Savory


Congrats to the pro winners on the weekend:

  • Singles; Andree Parrilla
  • Doubles: Parrilla & Sam Murray
    r2 link: https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39311
    Lets recap the Pro Singles draw:
    In the 16s, I had my eye on a couple of matches that might be close … but in the end, the draw went essentially chalk to the quarters. I say “essentially’ because #9 Javier Mar took out #8 Erick Trujillo 8,3, which may be an upset by seed but certainly is not by talent. The other pro-vs-pro round of 16 that looked intriguing turned into a blowout, with #7 Eduardo Garay Rodriguez handling #10 Alan Natera 12,3.
    In the quarters:
  • #1 @AnAndree Parrilla made fast work of #9 Mar 7,6. This used to be a much closer rivalry, now Mar has his work cut out to close the gap.
  • #5 Andres Acuña cruised past #4 @Sebastian Franco 9,3 on his home courts.
  • #6 @Rodrigo Montoya got a statement win over #3 @Eduardo Portillo 9,9; tour observes often wonder what would happen if Montoya committed to the tour full time, with his full attention. Could he be a top 5 player?

– #2 @Samuel Murray cruised past #7 Garay 4,7.

Both Semis featured great comebacks from the top seeds.

  • #1 Parrilla dropped the first game to the home-town favorite Acuna before advancing (😎,12,2.
  • #2 Murray looked like he was going to lose two fast ones to the athletic Montoya, but held on to win (😎,12,7.

In the final: Parrilla and Murray played a barn burner, each going through multiple shirts and fighting both each other and the humidity before Andree pulled away at 7-7 in the breaker to take it. Solid match.

Pro Doubles review:
The pro doubles went completely chalk to the finals, where #1 Montoya/Mar took on #2 Parrilla/Murray.

In that final … Parrilla & Murray, who had just walked off the court as singles competitors in the final, teamed up to take out the #1 Montoya/Mar pairing 13,13. This is an interesting result for me: Montoya & Mar are an accomplished, veteran team who have shown the ability to beat any other pairing in the world. Meanwhile, Parrilla just spent the last season exclusively playing doubles with Portillo … who was here in Costa Rica. So why didn’t the two play together? Meanwhile, Murray normally plays with Landa and has for several years and is securely ranked #2 on the doubles circuit. Is he looking for a change?

Men’s open review:
The Men’s open draw was nearly the size of the Men’s singles draw and featured some interesting players and interesting results.
From the top half, #1 Erick Trujillo topped #4 @Set Cubillos in one semi, while #2 @Alan Natera took out #3 former IRT touring pro @Felipe Camacho in the other. Camacho advanced in part by topping LPRT #5 @Ana Gabriela Martinez along the way in a breaker.

In the Open singles final… Trujillo got a solid win against a tough veteran player in Natera to take the Open title.

Thanks to Dean Baer and Pablo Fajre for making the trek to San Jose to broadcast for us!

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LPRT 2021-22 Season ending Standings and Season Wrap-up Part 1: the top 10

Longoria wraps up her 13th pro title. Photo via US Open 2019, Kevin Savory


The Kansas City SuperMax last week also marked the official end of the 2021-22 season. After a covid-ravaged season, the LPRT ended up this season with 9 events, including three majors.


The final season rankings have been updated to the website: see https://www.lprtour.com/lprt-singles-rankings for the year end standings.
We have captured the standings and uploaded them to the proracquetballstats.com website, where they will now be picked up in all year end rankings queries as appropriate. For example, click here http://rb.gy/x0t9jz for the year end singles standings in the database, and click here http://rb.gy/ysxyi8 to see how they flow into the Season Summary report.

Here’s some commentary on the LPRT finishers. We’ll break this post into four posts; in this post we’ll talk about the top 10, then talk about 11-20, then the rest, then list notable news items that happened this season to finish it off.

  1. Paola Longoria : finishes #1 for the 13th time (see here for a list of all LPRT year end title winners: https://www.proracquetballstats.com/…/lprt_year_end… . She now has nearly double the next closest player, that being Michelle Gould with 7 year end titles.
    Longoria won 6 of the 8 events she entered, but showed a chink in the armor with two successive tourney final losses to #2 Herrera. She ends the season with a 600 point lead at the top; by way of comparison she ended last season leading the tour by nearly 1,000 ranking points.
    Still, her dominance this season should not be overlooked; finishing a season 31-2 is no mean feat. We have a tendency to focus on the losses for our two GOATS of the sport, not the wins. She’s still the #1 until someone takes it from her.
    Predicted Rank next season: #1 again.

2 Alexandra Herrera ; she finishes #2 for the second year in a row, but this #2 finish seems meaningful. For me, she has clearly taken over the title of “Best player not named Paola,” a title owned by Vargas for the past couple of years, and then Salas for a few years prior to that. Herrera found a way to beat Paola, and will be thinking she can continue the trend.

The beginning of next season should be rather interesting, as Herrera has a good chance of really narrowing that points gap and putting Longoria’s reign at #1 in jeopardy.
Predicted Rank next season’s end: #2 again.

3 Maria Jose Vargas finishes #3, having made three finals and three semis, but took some earlier-than-expected losses this season. She is also 4 months pregnant, which puts her childbirth right in the middle of the fall section of the LPRT schedule, meaning she’s likely to miss significant time next season. She missed an entire season earlier in her career after having one child and she missed half a season in 2017-18 around the birth of her second kid. So we’ll see how much she can factor in next year. Suffice it to say, there likely will be a new #3 next year.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: outside the top 20

4 Natalia Mendez improved to a year end ranking of #4, her career best, by playing consistently and generally playing up to her seeds. She made three semis, three quarters, and had three first round upset losses on the year. She’s a good ways behind Vargas for #3, and the players who finished 4-5-6 are relatively tightly packed and could see some shuffling into next season.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #5 or #6: i think she gets bumped down.

5 Gaby Martinez managed to finish ranked 5th on tour (and missed out on 4th by less than 30 points) this season despite missing 4 of the 9 events played, quite a feat. She did this by becoming the 31st player ever to win a LPRT tier 1 event back in August in Denver, when she took the World Singles & Doubles title as the #10 seed. This powered her to a huge jump in ranking (she finished last season ranked #11).

It wasn’t too long ago (March 2019) that Gaby announced she was “retiring.” Since then, she’s managed to play more than half the pro events. If she played 100%, one has to wonder if she’s be pushing Herrera for #2.
Predicted Rank next season’s end: #4/#5 if she plays enough events.

6 @Erika Manilla is the clear Player of the Year on tour. After playing just 9 pro events in her career, she played all 9 this season and vaulted herself from a ranking in the upper 30s to the #6 spot on tour. She had wins this year over Gaby, Mejia, Barrios, and Parrilla, and earned her first US National singles title. Quite the season. She’s within striking distance of #3 on tour (as are several players in this range), so the fall of 2022 could be super interesting.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #3. I think Manilla will continue to rise up and take Vargas’ place at #3.

7 Angelica Barrios finishes the season ranked 7th, a one-spot improvement from last year. She made 3 semis and was upset in the 16s three times (by Manilla, Gaby, and Rhonda), so kind of an up and down pro season. Of course, Barrios’ major accomplishment this year was taking the PARC title on home soil, beating four top players in a row (Lawrence, Herrera, Gaby, and Vargas) to do so.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #5 or #6; incremental update, but not enough to press the top 4.

8 Jessica Parrilla may have dropped back a spot from last season’s finish, but she accomplished something this season that she hadn’t since Jan 2018: she advanced to a Pro semi final. Since badly injuring her knee in June of 2018, Leoni has endeavored to get back to her rankings peak (she finished 2017-18 at #3 on tour), and this was a big first step. She needs to get out of the 8-9 spot though, which plays into #1 every quarter, in order to have a chance to really move up.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #7 /#8: i think she’s right in the same range again next season.

9 @Rhonda Rajsich finishes #9 on the year, missing out on #8 by a scant 5.5 points, and finishes in the LPRT top 10 for an amazing 22nd consecutive season. She made four quarters out of nine events and got some really solid wins along the way. Additionally, Rhonda had solid results at both international events this year, and qualified for the US Team for the 20th time.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: just outside top 10: I think father time is catching up.

10: Montse Mejía finishes 10th despite going into the season’s final event as the #6 seed and reaching the final. Three missed tournaments and a couple of shaky early round losses conspired against Montse this season, and even a grand slam final couldn’t make up the difference. Mejia is one of the more talented players on tour, with a classical style and athleticism to beat any player she faces, and the new season setups better for her to make an impact.

Predicted Rank next season’s end: #4, assuming she continues to miss events and not play full time.

Players 7-10 were very tightly bunched; Less than 30 points separated them at season’s end. To put that in context, players get 25 ranking points for making just the round of 16 in a normal tour stop. So, suffice it to say, the 7-10th players will quickly switch places next season as play picks back up.

Check back in for Part 2, where we cover the players who finished 11-20.

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IRT Costa Rica Tier 3 Preview

Acuna welcomes pro players to his home club as a host this weekend in San Jose. Photo US Open 2019 Kevin Savory


The Costa Rica country club in San Jose is hosting an IRT event for the first time (I believe) since 2019, and they’ve got a nice solid draw. Lower tier events are not put into the proracquetballstats.com database because they’re not “full draws,” but they generally get a good chunk of the IRT top 10 and definitely contribute ranking points.
r2 link; https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/home.asp?TID=39311
Here’s a preview of the draw in San Jose this weekend; the tourney runs Weds-Sat so play will start on 6/15/22. There will be streaming, which is awesome, and per the IRT’s posts streaming starts thursday with the quarterfinals.
Singles preview:

  • 25 players entered, including 3 guys from the current top 10 (Parrilla, Murray, and Portillo) and another 5 guys from the 11-20 range (Franco, Acuna, Garay, Montoya, and Trujillo) and a couple of big names from the 21-30 range who can make noise (Mar, Natera).
    There’s a ton of players here from Guatemala, including their entire international team of Salvatierra, Wer, Mendoza, and Galicia. There’s also a great set of IRF vets from other countries: Cueva from Ecuador, Cubillos from Colombia, the Gaticas and Salgado from Chile, plus @Franciso Fajardo and some of Team Zurek.
    In the round of 16, look for these good matches:
  • 8/9 Trujillo vs Mar: a tough draw for the young Trujillo, getting a player in Mar who, when he’s “on” can be one of the best 8-10 players in the world. Mar has been out for a while nursing a core muscle injury, so this could be a close match.
  • 4/13 Mexican up and comer Sebastian Hernandez takes on veteran Franco in a good test for him, assuming he can get by the veteran Cubillos in the 32s.
  • 7/10 Garay vs Natera; this is an interesting match. Garay has been hit or miss touring lately, but should have the slight advantage over Natera.
  • 2/15: Murray vs Camacho; Camacho is a long-time former touring pro who can still ball; Murray has no cake walk here.
    Projected Quarters:
  • #1 Parrilla vs Trujillo/Mar winner: Parrilla has a tough quarter ahead.
  • #4 Franco vs #5 Acuna: Look for Acuna to hold serve at his home club
  • #3 Lalo vs #6 Montoya: tough matchup for Lalo here; Montoya is better than his ranking
  • #2 Murray vs Garay/Natera winner: this should be a win for Murray on paper, but both of these players can cause trouble.

My projected semis and Final: Parrilla over Acuna, Montoya over Murray. Final Parrilla over Montoya. However … if the semis turn into this quartet of players, its “any given sunday” because I think all four of these players are tightly bunched and can beat each other. Should make for some great Friday and Saturday action.

Doubles:
One of the best doubles teams in the world is here in Montoya/Mar; I see them topping Garay/Franco in one semi. In the other side, Portillo/Acuna versus Parrilla/Murray is an interesting doubles match. Portillo/Parrilla were a “team” for sometime recently but now are apparently splitting up. Acuna doesn’t really have a regular partner since Camacho stopped touring, but Portillo has shown he’s a solid player. I’ll go with Lalo/Acuna in an upset.

However, the final is all Montoya/Mar, irrespective of who comes out of the bottom side.

Looking forward to more live pro racquetball this week!

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LPRT TeamRoot.com SuperMax Wrap-Up

Longoria wraps up her 12th pro titile. Photo via US Open 2019, Kevin Savory


Congrats to your winners on the weekend:

  • Singles: Paola Longoria
  • Doubles: Alexandra Herrera/Erika Manilla
    Longoria secures her 107th career Tier1 title and sews up her 12th year end #1 title. Manilla wins her first ever pro doubles title, teaming with the hobbled Herrera.
  • R2 Sports App home page for event: https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=39192

Lets review the notable matches in the Singles draw.

Singles Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/466E25

In the 32s, a couple of notable results:

  • In the 16/17, Lotts got a solid win over MRR in a breaker.
  • In the 15/18, Scott held serve and downed Centellas in a breaker.
  • Munoz absolutely destroyed Meneses 0,4 to move on. Meneses has gone from one promising result after another to getting blown away in the last two pro stops.

In the 16s, a slew of upsets and surprising results.

  • #1 Longoria was pushed to a breaker by Lotts before advancing. These two played in the South Carolina event a month ago and it was a 3,1 beat-down. Bravo to Lotts for playing really well here.
  • #8 Manilla got a really solid win over #9 Parrilla to continue her excellent run of form.
  • #5 Gaby was pushed to a breaker by #12 Laime (now representing Colombia)
  • #13 Salas got an upset win over #4 Mendez in a breaker.
  • #3 Vargas was upset by #14 Munoz in a breaker. (note: Vargas is roughly 4months pregnant, a likely factor in the upset loss, not taking away anything from Carla’s solid win of course).
  • #6 Mejia looked quite dominant over #11 Lawrence, and the bottom side of this draw has opened up widely for the defending champ (as we’ll see in a moment)
  • #10 Rajsich turned back the clock on #7 Barrios, a player half her age, to advance to the quarters.
  • In the biggest upset, #2 Herrera, who reportedly was in a walking boot last week, defaulted her match to American Hollie Scott after just a few points.

    So, that’s #2, #3, #4, #7, and #8 out at this juncture, a ton of upsets.

Also, 3 American’s into the quarter finals for the first time in a pro event since 2016.

In the Quarters:

  • #1 Longoria was pressed in game two by Manilla, but held on for a 4,13 win.
  • #13 Salas turned back the clock and got her second top -5 win in a row, dominating Gaby 5,12 to return to the semis for the first time since this event last year.
  • #6 Mejia made fast work of Munoz 1,7
  • – #18 Scott dominated her fellow team USA teammate Rajsich to make her first ever pro Semi final.

In the Semis, no real shocks. #1 Longoria trounced Salas to beat her for the 55th time in 58 pro meetings, while #6 Mejia handled Scott efficiently to setup a rematch of last year’s final in this same event.

In the Finals, Mejia bent Paola but did not break her, getting close but losing 14,10.

Points Implications of results
Not much changes in the top 10: Longoria already had #1 sewn up and the top 5 spots shouldn’t change. Manilla should jump to #6 on tour, her highest ever ranking. Despite making the final here, Mejia will take a tumble in the rankings due to expiring points but should remain in the top 10. Rajsich should keep her top 10 ranking to secure her 22nd straight season in the top 10.

However, this is all speculation until we see the final LPRT season-ending rankings, at which point we’ll do a recap and talk about movements in the rankings.

Doubles review
Match report in the PRS database: http://rball.pro/19DB35
The big storyline in the doubles draw was the upset of the #1 team Salas/Longoria in the semis; they were dethroned by the Guatemalan veteran doubles team of Martinez/MRR. They met the new Herrera/Manilla team in the final, who survived Alexandra basically playing on one leg to get a tiebreaker win over Parrilla/Mejia.

In the final…Herrera may have been hobbled but when the ball came to her she executed, and she/Manilla took the doubles title.

Women’s Open:

The only other draw here was the Women’s Open, which went mostly chalk and featured #1 Barrios taking out #2 Lawrence in the final.

Thanks for all the streaming on the weekend, especially from broadcasters Timothy Baghurst and special guests Sudsy Monchik and Leo Vazquez.
Once again, thanks to Randy Root for your generosity in sponsoring the biggest prize purse in the sport.

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.

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

There’s a lower tier IRT event in Costa Rica next weekend, then the next big event is US Junior Nationals in Des Moines.

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