04/11/14
Gold medals returned to all corners of Great Britain as a record 58 players took part in the 11th National Learning Disability Tennis Event, organised by the Tennis Foundation in partnership with Special Olympics Great Britain, at Nottingham Tennis Centre.
It was another fine tournament for the local players from the Special Olympics East Midlands Tennis Group based in West Bridgford, Nottingham, who won three singles gold medals, while players from Scotland West also won three gold medals in their respective singles events.
With all the players divided in 13 men’s singles groups and three women's singles groups and competing against their peers of like tennis ability, Scotland West’s Dominic Iannotti marked his debut in the men’s Division 1 singles at the National event by following up his victory in the corresponding group at September’s Regional Series tournament in Glasgow.
Iannotti remained unbeaten in his three matches to beat Birkenhead’s Peter Millar and Builth Wells’ Shain Lewis into silver and bronze medal positions, respectively. However, Lewis and Millar turned the tables in the men’s Division 1 doubles as they remained unbeaten in their three matches to win gold.
Ronan Cacace and Jack Dickson ensured that two more gold medals went back to Scotland after winning the men’s Division 4 and Division 12 singles, with Dickson getting the upper hand in a three-way tie with Stamford Bridge’s Cameron Long and Nottingham’s Leigh Foster in Division 12. All three players won one of their three matches, but Dickson won the gold medal with a better percentage of games won against games played.
The men’s Division 3 singles, Division 7 singles and Division 10 singles also all ended with the gold and silver medallists tied after two wins apiece. Zach Brookes beat fellow Birmingham player and silver medallist Martyn Williams 6-3 to win the gold medal in Division 3, while Scott Brown finished top of the podium in Division 7 after beating fellow East Midlands player and silver medallist Aiden Leigthon 6-1. Grantham’s Aidan Bennett took gold medal honours in Division 10 after edging out silver medallist David Jones in a tie-break 7-6(2).
Brown’s fellow East Midlands players James Cregan and Dominic Hubner both remained unbeaten in their singles matches to win the gold medals in Division 9 and Division 11 respectively. Meanwhile, Brown and Hubner both completed the tournament with two gold medals apiece as combinations of East Midlands players finished top of the podium in the men’s Division 3, Division 4 and Division 5 doubles.
Brookes also returned home to Birmingham with two gold medals after he partnered Williams to win the men’s Division 2 doubles, dropping just three games across their three matches.
Dawn Taylor, from Ferndown, Dorset and Lily Mills, from Islington, London combined to add the gold medal in the women’s doubles to their Division 1 and Division 2 singles gold medals, with York’s Laura Wells clinching the gold medal in the women’s Division 3 singles after winning all three of her matches to edge out Nottingham’s Katherine Ashcroft.
Ashcroft went one better than her singles silver medal when she partnered Foster to win the gold medal in the mixed doubles, the Nottingham duo comfortably winning all three of their matches as York’s Wells and Matthew Wregglesworth took the silver medal.
Wregglesworth ensured that a gold medal went back to York after he won both his men’s Division 13 singles matches, while the other singles gold medals went back to Essex, Gloucestershire, Devon and Kent. Upminster’s Oliver Beadle and Upton St. Leonards ’ Robert Fisher were both unbeaten as they finished on top of the podium in the men’s Division 2 and Division 8 singles, while Folkestone’s Tom Brownsword and Plymouth’s James Jennings returned to the south coast having won three matches apiece to win the men’s Division 5 singles and Division 6 singles.
“We had fantastic weekend with a high standard of tennis and it’s great to see our National event tournament growing year-on-year to become a three-day event for the first time this year. Before moving to Scotland and currently working with the disability tennis network up there I worked closely with the players at West Bridgford Tennis Club in Nottingham it’s very exciting to see to see all the players continuing to improve and make progress,” said Tennis Foundation coach and Special Olympics Great Britain National Tennis Coaching and Competitions Advisor Lesley Whitehead, who has her own reasons to celebrate this week after being named the winner of the Disability Award in the 2014 Tennis Scotland Awards for her work with Britain's learning disabled players.
“We had four regional tournaments this year leading up to out National event and next year we will have five regional tournaments across the country, so there’s plenty to look forward to in 2015, including the Special Olympics World Summer Games in Los Angeles.”
Find out more about learning disability tennis here.