Hi Keith

The Bristol event was excellent, loads of new faces
and superprly organised, the sport is definately
moving in the right direction.

See you in Dudley

Gary J
--- Keith Lesser <keith.lesser@...> wrote:

> 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
>
>
>




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