Play Begins...

By Tod Nguyen
Oct 12, 2001

This year the pace was "fast and furious", like the cars some of these players were driving! The largest bracket in the tournament was definitely the Men's Intermediate division. This was a tough division as the players had to win 5 rounds of play in order to win the first prize trophe. We had participants from High Schools, Colleges and men in their 40's competing in this exciting bracket. It was a great chance for the younger generation to meet older folks they normally don't "hang out" with. The Intermediate Men's Single championship game came down to Chris Tran and Alex Phi.. It was power against experience. It was hard fought, in the end experience came out a bit bruised, but on top.

The women bracket was the suprise of this year's tournament. We had the largest women turnout in the 3 year history of this event. The seeded players maintained their ranked skill of play and the finals results did not yielded any big surprises. Now that there is enough participation in the women's division, AsiaXpress.com may have two brackets for the women division instead of one for next year's tournament.

The Men's Advanced bracket saw many new faces this year as well as big upsets. The number one seeded player was defeated in early round this year by an new unknown player. By the time the tournament was over, most everyone discovered who this "unknown" player was. His name was Dashdavaa Erdenebilig, a representative from the Mongolian community, the Men's Advanced Single winner. Consistent forehand top-spin passing shot winners was this his claim to fame.

In the beginning bracket we saw lots of new faces and lots of intimidating old ones. Once again, our own Joe Nguyen, shown here in white "war paint", began another year of intimidation over skills. Needless to say, skills won out, but he's getting better! Keep it up Joe.

News is spreading fast on this tournament, check your email for tournament notification next year. We met lots of people who said they wished they could play this year, but couldn't due to other commitments. So next year, we are looking at running an even bigger tournament!

Now for the Winners...

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