The sound of sweetly struck tennis balls has been echoing around Trenance Park this week as over 200 hundred players have been busy competing in this year’s Newquay-Heron Open tennis championships.
The tournament, sponsored by Oceans BMW & Mini of Falmouth, is now in its 9th year and as a well run tournament with Grade 3 status, attracted players from all over the Country and the high standard of entry certainly provided stiff competition for Cornwall’s top players.
With often challenging, and sometimes nearly impossible, conditions for the players to deal with it was as much of a battle against the elements as it was against your opponent and the high winds meant that player’s concentration, technique, ability to adapt and mental strength were all thoroughly tested.
With so many highly ranked players travelling to Newquay it is always difficult for local players to make any progress, but we are delighted to report the following successes for Newquay youngsters.
Things are looking very promising for the future with Newquay’s Reef Leverton-Griffiths winning the boys title in the 8&u event after securing his place in the final with a tough semi against his friend and fellow Heron squad member Sammy Whiteleg. Reef is a member of the coaching programme at Heron and also has lessons with Adrian Williams of the Leverton-williams academy. This win for Reef is really well deserved and it’s great that his hard work and practice has paid off.
In the girls u8’s there was success for Heron player, Harriet Bradley whose recent improvement resulted in her making the semi-finals which, considering the quality of opposition, was an excellent achievement.
In the boys 12’s and under Newquay’s unseeded Tad Maclean went on the rampage disposing of the 2nd, 4th and 5th seeds on his way to the final. To have beaten one of those seeded and higher rated players would have been a very good result and to beat all three was a fantastic achievement and once again, no doubt due to a combination of Tad’s hard work and the quality coaching he is receiving from Steve Askey at Heron.
The final success for local Newquay players was in the Mens doubles with Heron pairing of Warren Nield and Jake Hartigan taking the Men’s doubles title. Despite the swirling wind Jake and Warren kept striking the ball sweetly and proved to be too consistent for their opponents Steve Lobb and Chirs Peters.
And as we go to press, the Newquay pairing of Louise Watson and Scott Sutherland are contesting the final of the open mixed doubles so there could be more good news to come.
A full list of the results from all the events follows and as you will see, there are a good number of Cornish players winning titles and contesting the finals, which is a great reflection on the standard of play and coaching in the County.
Finally a great thank you must go to tournament referee Sue Eames who once again ran the event superbly and a big thank you to the whole heron team for their efforts in making the tournament such a success.