Cambridgeshire Racketlon Open - Feb 17th

Starting at 9.00 on the dot a full schedule with 65 entrants to the
inaugral Cambrigeshire Open started. With 9 ladies and classes A -
D in the Mens it was always going to be a tight schedule. Luckily a
bearded man stepped up from Oxfordshire to orchestrate the show for
the day.

In the setting of surely one of the best Racketlon friendly venues
at Next Generation, Cambridge (a plug will help with getting the
venue next year!) the range of ages, standards and racketlon
profiles were on show in abundance. It was the setting for a number
of newbies to try there hand at the multiracket phenomenon, some of
which faired better than others. It is fair to say that maybe class
A is not a good starting ground! That said, the comments from all
were extremly promising so hopefully Cambridge can be added to the
circuit for future years, with a thriving network of racketloners
across the local area now.

The results of the day mostly followed the expected courses, with
some rising stars coming through in a number of the classes to claim
the sought after gift voucher prizes.

In Men's A James Greenhead is on a roll, taking the first two
British Tour events by storm. Keenan Hamza, runner-up to James
defeated a black thumbed Ray Jordan in the quarter finals and then
fourth seed Keith Lesser in the semi-finals. Hamza couldn't quite
penetrate Greehead's soliditiy but in many ways Keenan resembles the
James Greenhead that joined the tour some years ago, with rusty but
improving table tennis and solid ability in badminton, squash and
tennis, with tennis looking quite tasty and squash also.

Fiona Sime could not add to her English Champs crown bowing out in
3rd to Champ & Bristol Organiser Nat Lawrence and crafty fellow
Veteran Lorna See. It was encouraging to see some new faces to the
ladies circuit, though non could quiet find it to beat Nat who looks
set to probably become the Michele Wei of Racektlon and take on the
Men. I'm sure she will make the cut.

In Mens class B victory went to Fred Floether, new to English
Racketlon, but not the sport. Having played in Belgium, it looks
like having taken Gary Jackson a seasoned class B pro apart in the
final that a step up to class a is awaiting.

Mens C provided the highlight of the day, with a final to wet the
appetite of anyone curious in the sport. New comer Olly
Collingbourne took on Samuel Pickup in what turned out to be a
closely fought final in all sports. Samuel taking the prize after a
tense tennis finale worthy of class A.

Mens D saw a comprehensive win for Matthew Lampard against new comer
Pete Scatchard. After Pete showed the whole class his superiority
in table tennis, his badminton let him down and was exploited in the
final by the all round game of Matt. Without such a big draw and an
organiser that didn't unfortunately know all the competitors Matt
would surely have been playing near the top of Class C, but still a
win is a win.

With a presentation at 5.10 having finished at exactly 5.00 the day
cam to a very nice close, with an exhausted host family of father,
brother and myself having to dismantle the table tennis table and
trek it in two visits the other side of the city the day ended.

A wonderful experience as a first tournament to organise and take
part in, though doing them together is not condusive to playing well
(that is my excuse for a complete inability to comprehend the game
of table tennis).

The success of the tournament was boosted further by a programme 2
weeks afterwards with with the BBC. Lizzy Greenwood Hughes from the
BBC emailed Keith Lesser via www.racketlon.co.uk's contact form.
Certainly one of the most interesting emails received in this means!
Next Generation was venue for a Sportsround production on Racketlon
featuring as Lizzy Greenwood Hughes put it "the Murray brothers of
Racketlon", Rhodri and Alexander Oliver. Please look out both on
BBC and the website for the the final, edited version of the
programme. We have yet to recieve confirmation of when they will be
showing the programme. Even if you miss it we will advise of the
replay on BBC iPlayer (replay service via BBC's website).

Thanks for all the came along on Feb 17th, please look out for the
next few tournaments starting with the Bristol Open and I hope to
see you all plus more newbies in the coming months. The British
Champs in Dudley (National Championships) and also the British Open
in Ipswich (World Ranking Points) are also live for entry.

Congrats to all winners!

Sam Scharf - Cambridge Racketlon Organiser