Along with Hardbat and Sandpaper Open events here at the Classic Nationals at the Austin Table Tennis Club, there were three other events – Women, Seniors and Juniors.

WOMEN

Sara Gulabani went 4-0 in the Final RR, not losing a game. In fact, the scores of her matches (games to 11) were 6,7,3,2,2,4,6,4,5,5,7,5 – so nothing really close. Coming in second was #5 seed Camilla Zilveti, going 3-1.

SENIORS

There were no upsets in the preliminary round robins – in fact, other than one 3-1 match, every match was 3-0. Let’s move to the semifinals.

Semifinals

· Jian Zhuang d. Lee Abraham, 14,5. Jian is just too steady, both in rallies and in putting the ball away when the shot is there.

· Steve Claflin d. Rick Mueller, 10,18. Steve said he played steady-aggressive against Rick the chopper, avoiding mistakes, not going for winners until the right shot came. In the second game, Rick adjusted and played more aggressive, and made it close.

Final

Jian Zhuang d. Steve Claflin, 6,8. Tournament Director and Hardbat Guru Steve said he’s a great “newcomer” to hardbat, starting up last year, and already making a big impact. As to the match itself . . . Steve said, “No comment.”

JUNIORS

Bryce Milford was just too much for the competition, defeating second-place finisher Michael Guo at 8,8,8 (best of five to 11), and Sara Bulabani at 15, 19 when they played this match as a best of three to 21. Michael had a devil of a time with third-place finisher Sara at the start, but won the match at -6,6,6,6.