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3WallBall in Las Vegas Highlights https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-website.asp?TID=37761

By now you have been seeing some great photos and videos of the largest outdoor event of the year - keep on posting!

 

The 12th edition of the Las Vegas 3WallBall World Championships presented by KWM Gutterman is in the history books and what an event it was. The booths were back this year, the state tents were back on site, people were able to gather and mingle and socialize in a more relaxed atmosphere. With our streaming partners, LPRT and IRT, pro matches streamed at the same time with over 150,000 views of matches played during and after the event. We have to give thanks to AGE Solutions and ProKennex for hosting this unique event as well at The STRAT for our location on the Las Vegas strip.

 

To all our sponsors; we appreciate you more than you know and work to increase your visibility with pre and post event promotion. Please support our major sponsors whenever possible as well as all those support this event. See www.3WallBall.com for more sponsor information. Major sponsors - Ahern Rental, Roscoe Halsey of LPL Financial, SodaMan Vending, Bella Vista Windows, MZ Companies, Team Root and our official ball provided by GearBox. We also saw the return of HEAD to the event. We thank our partners - USAR-WOR-NPA-MRF/MACS.

For the first time a paddleball match featuring handball players was showcased on our live stream emphasizing the beauty of a true multisport event which is what this major outdoor competition is about.

 

On a very crowded weekend in Vegas with EDC, a pool tournament, two conventions, WSP poker event a month and both hometown sports teams in action, the 2021 3WB edition brought 450 players to THE STRAT for excellent competition with stellar examples of the grace and athleticism of racquetball. Competing for a Prize Purse of over $24,000 and an additional $6,500 in handball and paddleball, drew a crowd of players.

 

Kicking off the event was a well-attended MRF/MACS Pro-Am Doubles in support of their mission to provide sporting opportunities to our wounded service members. 12 Amateur players battled with their Pro partners to find Brian Pineda & Larry Cesareo taking Daniel de la Rosa in the playoff. This is a great way to provide your support and your donations are greatly appreciated!

 

Racquetball and paddleball swung into action Thursday morning with all courts seeing action, that evening brought the return of our special event Ladies night sponsored by Bella Vista Windows & Doors with Susie Boulanger, Lisa Bu and Maddie Melendez playing host.

Friday had the courts shared as our handball brethren gathered for some very intense competition.

 

Tywan Cook bested our visiting Spaniard Sasha Kruithof-Perello (who was here to film a documentary) in Men’s A’s One-Wall and took the doubles for good measure with Nazir Marston. The same result repeated for Juan Santos as he claimed the Men’s A’s Three-Wall over Sasha and the doubles with Eddie Rocha. Our finalists were Manny Carbello & Stalin Nivelo and Chris Tojin and Carlso Erazo respectively. The Small Ball crown was captured by Adrian Oritz. To round out our Friday, we introduced an ice cream social hosted by SodaMan – Rick Koll

 

Saturday dawned with a bit of a change of scenery as a freak wind event in the very early morning hours tore down virtually every canopy and sent the ProKennex booth (20x’x20’) tumbling onto the courts. Thankfully this occurred at night; all cleaned up and play continued as if it hadn’t happened. (Thank You Ruben Antilla). Then it was on to the military Up/Down division demonstrating the skills of our adaptive athletes alongside our generous volunteers.

 

Working our way through 66 divisions, the return of the adaptive up/down racquetball division and introducing a specialty event to crown Eric Fernandez King of the Court, we moved to the 2021 CPRT final was the highlight of Saturday night with Ironman Robert Sostre and Greg Solis besting Tom Gerhart and Pat Allin. The Rancho High School ROTC Color Guard followed in a ceremony to honor our Heroes and Adaptive racquetball players which lead into the Men’s Pro Paddleball doubles where the team of Daniel de la Rosa & Alvaro Beltran displayed their multisport skills by downing the capable team of Emmett Coe & Sebastian Fernandez

 

Sunday morning began with high anticipation – 3-Wall Finals – The Men’s Pro Singles featured Mario Mercado over Alan Natera and the Womens Pro Singles went to Carla Munoz with Erica Williams taking second. Men’s Pro doubles match between defending champions, Daniel & Alvaro versus first time finalists Jason Geis and Micha Rich. Lest you think that it was all about the dudes…. In a reversal of fortunes, the Women’s Pro Doubles saw last year’s finalists Carla Munoz and Michelle de la Rosa defeat Janel Tisinger-Ledkins (8 months pregnant this year) and Katie Neils.

 

Closing out the 2021 event was the showcase Pro Mixed doubles reunited finalists Greg and Janel going down to Daniel & Michelle de la Rosa. The team DLR continues to dominate as the winningest Pro Mixed team in 3WallBall-Vegas’ history with 7 of the 8 finals going their way.

The One-Wall Pro Divisions had Nick Riffle & Adam Manilla over Alan Natera & Charlie Pratt in the Men’s, Victoria Rodriguez and Katie taking the Women’s division and Mixed team Rick Koll partnering with Michele DLR to top Amie Brewer &Tom Gerhart.

 

On the Amateur side, the largest draw of 26 teams had Vegas locals Larry Cesareo and Rob Hanson besting Gary Durbin and Bill Craig in the Men’s A doubles division. In another substantial draw, Sawyer Lloyd caught a WBF as his opponent CJ Sanders tumbled, striking his head on the ground in a frightening accident. Happy to report that CJ is ok.

All the results are available on the R2Sports results page, be sure to follow your favorite players on the R2Sports App.

 

A hearty Thank You to all those involved in making this event happen from literally the ground up! From the folks that construct the courts to the staff the run desk operations who ran the event on time all weekend, the streaming teams, the medical team that kept our players healthy and safe, all the volunteers that helped with reffing and monitoring the courts; we could not have made it through the week without all of you.

 

It takes serious time and money – be a supporter of the 3WallBall experience. We need you and the sport needs you.

 

2021 is behind us, we had a chance to play together and experience a return to a more normal celebration of our sport. Encouraged by the number of indoor players becoming regular enthusiasts of the outdoor game. Happily, we recognized that racquetball is racquetball no matter the number of walls. Skill, experience, attitude and just plain bangin’ the ball is what makes racquetball so great.

 

We don’t know yet, what 2022 might bring - stay tuned.

 

The full results for the 2021 3WallBall World Championships can be found at https://www.r2sports.com/website/event-results.asp?TID=37761.

 

And don’t forget that you can watch and rewatch a number of the Pro matches, early pairings to the finals at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3IUtyASra8EXpJCdNieGXw