Racquets World Championship

Last Saturday in New York, the Racquet & Tennis Club hosted the world racquets championship. It was the first leg of a Atlantic-bestriding event, with the second leg being played at Queen's Club in London this Saturday. The current world champion, James Stout hammered the challenger, Alex Titchener-Barrett, 15-11, 15-7, 15-6, 15-9. It could be a long reign for the Bermudian bomber, who is just twenty-six.

The world championship is pretty cool in that it is the oldest continuously contested world sporting title (officially since 1820, though practically only since 1860). I wrote about the sport recently for Vanity Fair: http://www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2009/04/play-surviving-a-racquets-tournament.html.

The Silver Racquets weekend at the R&T was typically amazing. Huge draws. Some new faces: Goose Detter and Baset Ashfaq (two of the young guys featured in my new book http://runtoroar.com/) played in the squash doubles tournament. Some upsets: Pat Winthrop won the tennis singles over Alexis Hombrecher.

Four hundred and forty people came to the dinner dance. A maxed out affair, the club had to turn away about a hundred people because there was no room. Why the interest?

Well, perhaps they heard it is the most romantic way to fall in love. After all, it was on a blind date at the Silver Racquet dinner dance in 1999 that I met my wife.

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