A Great "Dey" For Taprabrata
 
 
The Newgy Cincinnati Open was the first 4-Star USATT sanctioned event held in Cincinnati during the last 8 years.  With over 100 entries and 20 professional tables, this (soon to be) annual event has had a great beginning.  We plan to continue with the same giant round robin format – groups of 8 with the top 4 players advancing to the next round.
 
May 10th was a great day for Tapabrada Dey.  After advancing from the under 2400 giant round robin and making it to the semifinals, he next won 8 consecutive matches to advance to the open finals.  In the u2400 semifinals, he was stopped short by the eventual winner, Danny Dulkin.  Danny has just returned from some intense training in Romania and has developed a massive forehand counterloop that was just too strong for Tapa.  In the Open final, Tapa was stopped by Samson Dubina with a 3-0 loss.  The third place prize money was awarded to 13-year-old chopper Hesam Hamrahian who defeated Danny Dulkin.
 
The under 2000 giant round robin was won by Akron’s Harsh Khandelwal who was just too steady for the competition.  After holding off 4 match points from Shreyans Bafna, Harsh went on to sweep the semifinals 3-0 against Greg Smith and the finals 3-0 against Kosal Tith.  The under 1800 featured 2 Cincinnati players with Bob Burkart coming out on top and Francisco Jimenez leaving with the finalist trophy.  Chad Ryan was the star of the u1600 giant round robin.  Chad had pulled off a number of upsets throughout the weekend and finished the deal with winning the event over Kevin Swan.  The u1200 and u1000 were both won by experienced women – Yueling Zhang and Laura Paglin respectively.
I would like to thank our staff and volunteers who made this event run in such a timely manner    -   Barry Carlin, Tom Leslie, John Monaco, Greg Thompson, Pierce Scott, Perry Wilson, Sam Dubina, Nancy Dubina, Randy Burnett, Joyce Burnett, Rick Wilson, Mike Wilke, Burak Cevik, Joe Scott, Raymond Johnston, Karen Pon, Orlando McEwan, Bobo Shi, Roger Liu, and Seth Pech.  I would also like to thank our loyal sponsors:  Newgy Robo-Pong, Martin & Associates, Wil-Cut Company, Nittaku, Paddle Palace, APSX Wide-band, and Pongtrac!  Please support them!  We plan to move to much larger facility next year that can accommodate 30-40 tables. The entry form will be available soon at www.samsondubina.com.
Tournament Results
 
Open Giant RR
1st Samson Dubina
2nd Tapabrada Dey
3rd Hesam Hamrahian
4th Danny Dulkin
5th-8th Ali Khatami, Alex Averin, Seth Pech, and John Allen
 
U2400 Giant RR
1st Danny Dulkin
2nd Seth Pech
3rd-4th Nick Snider and Tapabrada Dey
 
u2000 Giant RR
1st Harsh Khandelwal
2nd Kosal Tith
3rd-4th Willians Calipo and Greg Smith
 
U1800
1st Bob Burkart
2nd Francisco Jimenez
3rd-4th Scott Badillo and Xiaofeng Guo
 
U1600 Giant RR
1st Chad Ryan
2nd Kevin Swan
3rd-4th Joe Ciarrochi and Yi Yan Xue
 
U1200 Giant RR
1st Yueling Zhang
2nd Newell Millard
3rd-4th Matt Seeds and Lin Wang
 
U1000 Giant RR
1st Laura Paglin
2nd Aubrey Morris