UTR Prize Money Tournament

Top-ranked juniors, college players, and ex-pros battled it out in our first official UTR tournament.

Three days, 37 players, a $100 prize, and a whole lot of tennis! Our first ever UTR prize money tournament at the Hopewell Tennis and Swim Center between January 15-17 was a huge success. We had run a few small tournaments in the past for our high performance and high school players, but this was our first time organizing a multiple day verified UTR event and we can’t wait to hold more in the future! We had an absolute blast watching these talented and competitive high school, college, and adult players battle through the weekend to see who would be the winner of our trophies and prize prize money.

We had some amazing talent come out for the weekend, including 4 ex-professional players, 10 active college players, and 2 junior blue chip recruits. Our singles champion, Rob Chess, reached 339 in the ATP world ranking in 1997 and is still an avid tournament player. En-route to the championship, Chess defeated Connor Nelson of Division 1 Holy Cross and Peter Leese of Division 3 University of Mary Washington to go up against fellow ex-professional Brant Switzler in the final round. Switzler played on the Futures tour as recently as 2017 and won the doubles draw alongside his partner and current student, four-star recruit Joshua Lai. Switzler and Lai defeated Matthew Slowinski and William Kelleher of Holy Cross in the final round on Sunday to wrap up the weekend. 

Since UTR rates all players regardless of age, gender, and level on the same 1-16 scale, we were able to place players in draws without having to worry about levels being mismatched. We were able to hold the entire prize money tournament in one round of 32 singles draw and one quarter-final doubles draw. It was a ton of fun to have male and female players of many different ages competing against each other in a fair environment. UTR’s in our draw ranged from 6-12 with the average UTR being an 8.5. 

The weekend was an absolute blast and we can’t wait to hold more events this coming summer! We’re currently planning to have weekly matchplay events as well as a prize money tournament series beginning in June, so stay tuned for more info!