(by Angel Naranjo)

This tournament for me means an end of an amazing chapter of my junior years. I couldn’t achieve all my goals I had for this tournament but I’m very happy to have finished with a gold in U19 Boys Singles. It means a lot to me to have won this event 3 times, it was my goal but to achieve it means much more.

My results in the competition were:

• 2023 ITTF Pan American Youth Championships (U15 and U19)
  • U19 Boys Singles, Gold
  • U19 Boys Doubles (with Derek Valentin), Silver
  • U19 Mixed Doubles (with Brianna Burgos), Bronze
  • U19 Boys Teams, Bronze

I started with a rocky start in teams, not feeling my best mentally and physically. I was still adapting but I stayed positive every step of the way and kept adapting in the training hall. When it came down to the next few events I was in a better shape. For Singles I knew I wanted to win and that it wouldn’t be easy so I just played match by match and kept focusing on myself, not who I was playing or what round I was in. This helped me a lot to win my matches. I started feeling more confident match after match and suddenly I felt playing my best. I noticed also the level has gone up. There are many good players now and many that are playing a lot better. This also motivated me to give it my all for this last title in the 2023 Pan Am Youth Championships.

All the sacrifices I’ve made and days I’ve sweat have all been worth it. This isn’t my last Junior tournament of the year, I still have Youth World Championships and a few youth contenders along the way but at least continentally, it is. For next year I’ll enter fully for senior and I’ll keep preparing and training hard to keep achieving my goals. Looking forward to what the future brings.