By: Erik Hjorleifson
It was action packed week of pool at Steinway billiards in Astoria New York for the Women's International 10 ball Championships. In the end it was Ga Young Kim from Korea who took down the $12, 500 first prize in convincing fashion against Vivian Villareal with a 17-10 win. Both players advanced fairly easily to the finals with undefeated 11-0 records. They were seeded #1 and #2 going into the final single elimination.
The semi finalists in the tournament were Jennifer Baretta and newcomer Denise Wilkinson from New Zealand. Wilkinson advanced through to the semi-finals with a win over Naomi Williams from Canada who had a breakthrough performance finishing 7-0 in the round robin stage and advanced to the quarter finals with wins over Belinda Calhoun and Tara Williams. Unfortunately Naomi fell under the weather as did many players as the tournament went on, and she had to settle for a tied for 5th place finish, sill a very good showing. Brittany Bryant the other Canadian star had a very good week as well finishing second in her round robin group and winning her first two matches in the single elimination redraw. She eventually went down with an 11-7 score line to eventual third place finisher Jennifer Baretta.
In all it was a positive step forward for women's pool in North America, which has been on a serious decline at the competitive level since the decrease in tournaments on the WPBA tour in the past few years. The WPBA is in dire straits right now with only one event scheduled for 2015 and as the women showed this week it is not for a lack of interest as they filled the field of 64 players. It is interesting to note that in China the popularity of women's pool far outweighs the popularity of men's and hopefully for the female players in North America they can see some of that popularity here in North America.
Results
1st Ga Young Kim $12 500
2nd Vivian Villareal $6000
3rd/4th Jennifer Baretta $3100
Denise Wilkinson $3100
5th/8th Naomi Williams $2140
Brittany Bryant $2140
Helena Thorfeldt $2140
Hiroko Makiyama $2140
No comments:
Post a Comment