Lollapalooza: lol·la·pa·loo·za also lal·la·pa·loo·za
n. Slang / Something outstanding of its kind
Loopalalooza: loop·a·la·loo·za
n. Slang / an outstanding table tennis event
We had all the ingredients for a great weekend of table tennis.
We ended up with a good weekend of table tennis.
In a nutshell: usatt sanctioned an Atlanta tournament the same weekend as ours.
Building on the momentum of our last few tournaments, more events, more
competition, more prize money, we were ready to offer the best tournament
possible. Limited by 7 tables, we expanded our event to saturday & sunday,
& came up with prize money over $1000, trophies & Butterfly sponsorship.
No reason to think we would not have a great turnout & the best tournament yet.
I had already received confirmations from Atlanta players from our last event,
as well as some hopefuls from contacts at the Cary Cup. Our junior event was
well attended & they were all on board to return.
Right up until another tournament materialized on the same weekend.
You can't blame the players, 4-5 hour drive compared to 20 minutes is a no brainer.
Up until now I thought all I had to do was offer competition & prize money to
insure a successful event. I left out one factor: the incompetence factor.
The regional coordinator told me he "didn't think the Atlanta event would affect
Charlotte much". No email, no notice, no offer to move their or my tournament.
I had no alternate date as all other weekends were booked by Cary & Raleigh clubs,
therefore no choice but to hope for the best.
We had a decent turnout overall, but it was not a Loopalalooza.
Our junior event suffered the most, adding to the frustration.
Anyone can set up some tables, send out some emails & have some fun playing
table tennis, & more power to all that do. We have the means & desire to do
more, & this has been conveyed to those at usatt & they have done nothing.
Worse than nothing, they actually sabatoged what was to be our biggest & best.
Regional & national coordinators push paper & have no involvement in actually
coordinating events by helping schedule events to the benefit of players.
A time period may be saturated with events, with poor turnouts, & usatt have no
interest in taking the lead, just taking our money.
Then wonder why there is no progress in our sport.
Last July we cancelled a 3 star event because usatt again sanctioned a Florida
US Open warm up the same weekend as our actual/official US Open warm up.
They had more prize money, (better prize money then the US Open), & nuked us.
Can anyone say deja vu?
They say you can't teach an old dog new tricks, same for a stupid dog.
On to the tournament!
Thanks to our sponsors: Butterfly & Paddle Palace.
Saturday Events
Under 18 Juniors
Elias Gomez jr 1st, Khoa Vu 2nd, Chris Rautenstauch 3rd & Christian Amidi 4th.
Elias is a level above our other juniors, he's 1100 going on 1600 & if he keeps
it up will be the best player in our club within 2 years.
Khoa Vu & Christain Amidi show great potential & improve weekly. There's a lot to
be said for enthusiasm. A little younger than Elias, they have a little catching
up to do, & could be on the same track thanks to their 1900 level dads.
Chris Rautenstauch played his 1st sanctioned tournament, showing natural ability
if a little rough around the edges.
Gomez & Rautenstauch teamed up for doubles & won over Vu & Amidi.
All players ended up with a trophy & looked forward to the U1500 event.
Under 1500 RR
Group 1
Elias Gomez jr earned points & a spot in the final 3 with wins over 1474 Frank
Zimmerman & 1171 John Traino. Zimmerman came in 2nd over Traino.
Very often these lower rated events pit younger players against seniors.
Elias is not being fooled by the awkward & sometimes unorthodox styles of
these seniors anymore & played well.
Group 2
A 3 way tie advanced 1015 Arjun Chauhan (1.33) over unrated Richard Sharpe (1.25)
& 1403 John Griffing (.6). Unrated Chris Rautenstauch was in every match but
came in 4th.
Group 3
Dave England (1334) advanced to the finals over Sekhar Reddy. Mike stroupe,
Khoa Vu & Christian Amidi. Reddy actually won over England but did not advance
being unrated. Unrated Stroupe won a tough one over Reddy to come in 3rd,
Vu & Amidi splitting 4th & 5th.
Final
Dave England's experience won over Gomez & Chauhan's energy & determination.
England collected $50 for 1st, Gomez got $20 for 2nd with a win over Chauhan.
Under 1750 RR
Group 1
Both Tim Hoagland (1603) & Rick Thigpen (1602) upset top seed Heiko Plankenhorn
(1746) leaving him with 3rd place. Hoagland won over Thigpen as well to advance.
Arjun Chauhan was a little overmatched here coming in 4th.
Group 2
This group fell in order with 1740 Elias Gomez sr 1st, 1615 Russell Buxton 2nd,
1519 Gerard Schreuders 3rd & unrated Richard Sharpe 4th. Lefty looper Buxton
pushed Gomez to 5 games & plays well for someone who plays tournaments every
2 months with no regular practice.
Group 3
Assen Dinkov (1735) didn't drop a game running over unrated Ming Shi, (1474)
Frank Zimmerman & (1127) Elias Gomez jr. Gomez upset Zimmerman 3-1 by looping
through the crafty lefty. Shi 2nd, Gomez 3rd & Zimmerman 4th.
Group 4
1637 John Pahl advanced with a 3-2 win over 1712 Ling Fan, as well as unrated
Sekhar Reddy & 1403 John Griffing. Fan came in 2nd, Reddy 3rd & Griffing 4th.
Group 5
1711 Bilal Soylu advanced over 1681 Yuri Godin, 1334 Dave England & 1171 John
Traino. The rest fell in order with Godin 2nd, England 3rd & Traino 4th.
Semi Final
Tim Hoagland, the winner of group 1 received a bye to the final 3 man RR.
Bilal Soylu won over Elias Gomez sr 5,-8,3,5. Soylu always had good strokes,
his favorite shot countering a kill with a kill of his own, but his recent
addition of long pips on his backhand troubled many saturday & sunday adding
another weapon to his arsenal.
Assen Dinkov won over John Pahl -8, 7,8,6. Dinkov has a laid back semi
defensive style that dares the opponent to attack & draws unforced errors
from his sidespin returns.
Final RR
Soylu won over Dinkov -7,7,9,9 & Hoagland 3,9,20 to claim $60 & 1st place.
Dinkov won over Hoagland -7,1,4,6 for $30 & 2nd place.
Under 3000 Doubles
3 groups of 3 advanced the top team to a 3 way final RR/
Dave England/John Pahl came in 1st winning over Elias Gomez sr/Elias Gomez jr
& Tim Hoagland/Sekhar Reddy. Winner take all 1st place: $60.
Under 3500 Doubles
2 groups of 4 sent the top teams to a final match.
Tom Miller/Ling Fan won their group 3-0.
Tim Hoagland/Sekhar Reddy advanced with a 2-1 record over Pahl/Plankenhorn's
2-1 record winning head to head.
Miller/Fan were too strong & had too much experience as a team winning the
event & $80 3-0. Miller can play righty or lefty, returning serve left handed,
usually for a winner Karakasavic style. He can then swtch to right hand
Seemiller style to block or hit another winner. Fan is a penhold cotrol
player able to win points off a forehand down the line & quick counters.
They plan on entering /winning the U4000 as well.
Grudge Match
Hatfields & McCoys step aside, there's a new rivalry in town.
Last October the Vu's, Van & son Khoa won over the Amidi's, Amir & son
Christian. The fathers are about equal in rating & ability, as are the sons.
The difference this time is the kids have greatly improved. They understand
spin better, therefore are serving & returning serve well, looping, smashing
& blocking at every opportunity. There were many long rallies with the dads
holding little back. Many truly impressive points.
Last time The Vu's won. This time the Amidi's won 13-11 in the 7th.
Sunday Events
Under 2000 RR
Group 1
Top seed here Jim McQueen (1987) came in at a recent carreer low & put his
rating points on the line showing no fear, & for good reason. You won't see
him loop, he rarely smashes, not much of a backhand to speak of, yet he ran
through this group like a hot knife through butter: 8,9,8,4,8,8,6,13,4.
Good serves, great short table game, drop shots, angles, winner blocks with
the added bonus of pips on 1 side to add spice. Elias Gomez sr (1740) 2nd,
Salil Surendran (1756) 3rd & Heiko Plankenhorn (1746) 4th.
Group 2
A 3 way tie had Tom Miller (1771) advance over 2nd place Assen Dinkov (1735)
& 3rd place Ray Filz (1884). Unrated Ming Shi came in 4th.
Group 3
Amir Amidi (1878) seemillered his group into submission leaving Le Ly (1734)
2nd, Stan Gee (1790) 3rd & Rick Thigpen (1602)4th.
Group 4
Probably the toughest preliminary group (almost every match went 5) had Van Vu
(1842) advance over 2nd place Chris OBrian (1849), 3rd place Bilal Soylu (1711)
& UK lefty looper Russell Buxton (1615).
Group 5
This group fell in order: Edem Komlanvi (1849), Tony Banjoko (1848), Yuri
Godin (1681) & Dennis Lee (1645). Odd: Komlanvi went 3 games with the 2nd seed,
4 games with the 3rd seed & 5 games with the 4th seed. Go Figure.
Semi Finals
Jim McQueen from group 1 received a bye.
Tom Miller resorted to his higher level of right handed seemiller style
(he usually plays lefty shakehand) to block down & pick hit away power looper
Edem Komlanvi, 8,7,8.
Van Vu was on fire looping from both sides no matter how often Amir Amidi
blocked, 6,6,3. Van looped off spin & no spin (from Amidi's short pips) &
made virtually no unforced errors.
Finals
Miller & Vu put up enough of a fight to each take a game off McQueen, but no
more. You can practice loops, smashes & blocks, but you can't practice
craftiness. (Maybe you can but most don't). McQueen plays the same game whether
you're 1500 or 2500, if you'll let him, & they did.
1st place & $100 to Jim McQueen.
Tom Miller came in 2nd winning $60 over Van Vu -9,6,5,7.
Open RR
Group 1
Pablo Perez (2084) gave up 1 game to win this group leaving Tony Banjoko (1848)
2nd, Salil Surendran (1756) 3rd & Elias Gomez jr (1127) 4th. Gomez jr clawed
his way to a 12-10 win but an eventual match loss against Surendran, showing
his improvement.
Group 2
1st major upset of the day with Tom Miller (1771) winning this group over 2nd
place john Lee (2017), 3rd place Dennis Lee (1645) & Heiko Plankenhorn (1746).
2nd upset was Dennis Lee's 3-2 victory over Plankenhorn.
Group 3
DJ Settle (2010) cruised to 1st place over Van Vu (1842), Assen Dinkov (1735)
& John Pahl (1637), the rest of the group falling in order.
Group 4
Jim McQueen (1987) continued his winning ways to advance. The rest fought it
out to a 3 way tie with LY Le (1734) 2nd, Ling Fan (1712) 3rd & Stan Gee (1790)
4th.
Group 5
Edem Komlanvi (1849) slightly upset Ray Filz (1884) 5,7,4 to advance. Bilal
Soylu (1711) came in 2nd also upsetting Filz in 5. He who lives by the pips,
dies by the pips. Elias Gomez sr (1740) put up a good fight but ended up 4th.
Group 6
Chris OBrian (1849) derailed Amir Amidi (1878) as well as Rick Thigpen (1602)
& unrated Ming Shi. Amidi 2nd, Thigpen 3rd & Shi 4th.
Tough group as Shi took both Amidi & Thigpen to 5 games.
Semi Finals
6 players, 3 matches to determine the final 3 man RR.
Pablo Perez took out Edem Komlanvi 6,7,8. They know each other well, & Komlanvi
unfortunately plays to Perez's strength: control. This seems to be the theme
for the day, power players falling to patient control players. That power loop
is impressive until it comes back, & when it comes back 2,3,4 times most get a
little frustrated. Another common failing is constantly trying for that point
ending shot instead of varying speed & spin. Just a thought.
Jim McQueen & DJ Settle also know each other well. Settle knows he has to be
aggressive & accurate, McQueen knows he can force errors making Settle loop
more than 1 or 2. Same match as above, different table. McQueen wins 10,-7,8,7.
Chris OBrian & Tom Miller usually play a grudge match for fun if they don't
meet during a tournament. Now it was on. If you can't return OBrians serves,
you're not in the game. He had Miller fooled this time 6,3,-6,9.
Finals
Outclassed is too harsh a word for Chris OBrian here, more like out weaponed.
OBrian has energy & a forehand, but that's it against this level of play.
Serves that fooled opponents earlier were now a liability. The weaker backhand
side was exploited. A good run but it ended here with 3rd place. Both Perez
& McQueen had just too much experience & depth.
Perez wins the final match, the event & $200 7,8,-9,9.
He was able to forehand loop when McQueen thought he couldn't, & with more spin
than anticipated. The Perez backhand is a winning weapon due to accuracy &
consistency over power. Perez could relax serving as McQueen virtually never
attacked off serve. This free pass gave Perez added advantage McQueen can't
afford trying to step up in class. McQueen's pips on 1 side were not a factor.
$100 for 2nd place to McQueen.
Open Single Elimination
Early round upsets:
Ling Fan (1712) over Edem Komlanvi (1849) 7,-8,-8,8,9.
Ming Shi (est 1600's) over Tony Banjoko (1848) 7,6,7.
Salil Surendran (1756) over DJ Settle (2010) -2,19,9,10.
Chris OBrian (1849) over John Lee (2017) 9,-8,9,-9,9.
Chris OBrian won his semi final over Amir Amidi (1878) 9,-8,8,9.
Pablo Perez (2084) came back from down 0-2 against Jim McQueen (1987) -9,-9,8,10,9.
Final
Pablo Perez won over Chris OBrian 6,5,6 for the winner take all $150.
Under 4000 Doubles
2 RR groups of 4 decided the final 2 teams.
In the end it was Tom Miller/Ling Fan (3483) against Amir Amidi/Heiko
Plankenhorn (3624) who both beat higher rated teams on their way to the
final. Amidi/Plankenhorn won 3-2 & split the $100 1st prize. Miller/Fan
play well together, but so did Amidi/Plankenhorn on their 1st outing.
Amidi's pips were a factor along with his lefty loops especially off
serve, while Plankenhorn looped often from both sides.
