Held last Saturday on 3/9/24, the March Madness Giant Round Robin was a smaller tournament but a great one for the ATTC community, but first I have to acknowledge that I forgot to write up the point gainers from the 2024 HITTA President's Day Tournament. We have to give flowers to our three juniors who hit their personal best ratings at the tournament: Aditya, Shandra, and Lekha. Congratulations!
Name | Begin Rating | End Rating | +/- |
Aditya Chirayath | 1848 | 1860 (PB) | 12 |
Shandra Qiu | 1678 | 1708 (PB) | 30 |
Lekha Subbaiah | 1088 | 1110 (PB) | 22 |
Now on to San Antonio ~ which saw a cornucopia of points gained by both the juniors attending and from our adult veterans.
Name | Begin Rating | End Rating | +/- |
Leonid Odinokov | 1216 | 1447 (PB) | 231 |
Brandon Babot | 1383 | 1440 | 57 |
Jeremey D Lopez | 1405 | 1481 | 76 |
Shreyas Sule | 2095 | 2108 | 13 |
Lekha Subbaiah | 1110 | 1194 (PB) | 84 |
While I don't know much about Lekha's game, watching her play, you can tell she's very good at moving to the right place and positioning herself for the right shot. I think we'll be seeing her hitting new personal bests for many more tournaments to come.
When Jeff, one of Leo's mentors, mentioned that he thought Leo would be 1600 by the end of this year, I really didn't think he'd be able to. But mathematically, he's now on track to achieve that and more. Looking at Leo's serve preparation and his follow-up forehand attacks, you can really tell he is taking his coaches advice to heart. While he naturally likes to smack the ball on the forehand, and lob on the backhand; every time he was reminded to play with spin, he executed it on next point. Congratulations to Leo, his mom Ana, and all of his coaches for a good tournament, ending with him winning the U1500 category.
From the adult side, we have Shreyas cleaning up on the U2100 side. Coming in just under the limit at 2095, Shreyas said this was his first tournament victory. The prize money funded his and his wife Shriya's dinner on the riverwalk afterwards. It was a return to form by Brandon and Jeremey, both managing to go deep into the bracket stage. Brandon "Bottleneck" Babot, played multiple back to back five-set games in a grueling gauntlet. I know that both players will definitely hit PBs later this year.
Event | First Place | Second Place | Third Place | 3rd/4th |
Carlos Hernandez | Viren Patel | Cyril Mayeux | 3rd-Shreyas Sule | |
Shreyas Sule | Ryan Martin | Caleb Dye | 3rd-Albert Felan | |
Caleb Dye | Sikander Aggarwal | Don Liu | 3rd-Steven Nguyendon | |
Leonid Odinokov | Brandon Babot | Nathaniel Dilworth | 3rd-Lekha Subbaiah | |
Sudhir Kumar | Coral Khieu | Jim Chase | 3rd-Olaf Westheider |
I want to end on appreciating this series of circus shots by Carlos Hernandez from HITTA, who strolled into town, and left with the fat check and trophy in under an hour. The levels to table tennis are insane and that's why we love it: