The Racquet Club of Chicago was proud to host the U.S. 50s Singles & Doubles from November 2nd – 4th 2018. The tournament was held in conjunction with the Rackets 50s Singles and Doubles events so stamina was going to be a key component in a successful weekend.
The singles went according to form with the top two seeds, Max Drake and Peter Dunne, progressing through to the final without dropping a set. The semi-final between Max Drake and Anders Cohen was one of the matches of the tournament as Max demonstrated his steely will in staging a comeback from 2-5 in the first set to eventually run out a 6-5 6-3 victory over the talented lefty. The final was played to an extremely high level with Max and Peter both producing their best tennis to date. Max started out strongly, using his railroad serve to devastating effect in winning the first set 6-2. Peter then got into the match controlling the service end and winning the second set by the same margin, 6-2.
The final set was a seesaw affair with Peter jumping out to a 3-0 lead. Max then got his railroad going again to reel off 4 games in a row and take a 4-3 lead.Both players were covering the court better than ever and with some tremendous rallies and shot execution took the match to 5 games all. Max started the final game at the service end and with some tight serving and consistent play pulled out the victory 6-5.
The doubles had three pairs with almost identical handicaps – any of these pairs could have won the tournament. The combination of Max Drake and Peter Dunne were at their best in defeating Greg Van Schaack and Anders Cohen 6-2 1-6 6-1.The third set score line didn’t really reflect the closeness of the match with Greg and Anders having multiple game points in the games that went against them. In the final Max Drake and Peter Dunne found themselves down 4-5 and set point in the first set before coming back well to take the set 6-5.They then took control of the match in the second set and with growing confidence ran away with it and the match 6-3.
Thank you to the Racquet Club and the tournament committee for their support and also to John Cashman, Steve Virgona, and Conor Medlow for their help throughout the weekend.
Max Drake & Peter Dunne
