Teenagers stole the show at the 56th annual Richmond Open.
Seventeen-year-old Luka Vukovic and 18-year-old Jessie Gong were the respective men and women’s open division champions of the Richmond Tennis Club event which wrapped up on Sunday.
Vukovic’s impressive run to the title concluded with a 7-6, 6-2 victory over No. 1 seed Carlo Ho as he solidified his status as one of the top juniors in the province.
He did not drop a set over the course of the tournament, defeating Patrick Walker, 6-0 and 6-4 in the semi-finals.
Ho, 27, is the High Performance Coach at the Richmond Country who played on a scholarship at the University of New Mexico. He did team up with Luigi Albarracin to defeat Vokovic and his brother Dimitrie in the open men’s doubles final 7-5, 5-5, 6-2.
Gong thrived in familiar territory as the soon-to-be McRoberts graduate rallied for an impressive three set (2-6, 6-4, 6-1) victory over top seed Alexandra Vagramov. She will be taking her career to the Ivy League level at Yale University in September.
Both finals took place indoors at the Town and Country Inn tennis facility in Ladner on Sunday as organizers scrambled to deal with the wet weather. In total, eight divisions were decided inside the bubble after 13 other finals were squeezed into Saturday’s schedule.
“Overall, we have been lucky in terms of the weather,” said tournament director Kim Jensen. “This is or biggest event of the year with about 40 or 50 club volunteers needed.”
The Richmond Open is sanctioned by Tennis B.C. and launches the B.C. Summer Series which features a number of tournaments throughout Metro Vancouver.
Here is a rundown of the other division winners:
Men’s 4.5 Singles: Sunil Dutt.
Women’s 4.5 Singles: Alejandra Margarita Gutierrez Romero.
Men’s 4.5 Doubles: Sunil Dutt/Pawandeep Varaich.
Women 4.5 Doubles: Laura Rankin/Katie Alexi Sakalauskas.
Mixed 4.5 Doubles: Jenny Hong/Bill Wang.
Men’s 4.0 Singles: Michal Reznicek.
Women’s 4.0 Singles: Angela Lo.
Men’s 4.0 Doubles: Peter Acton/Daryl McMillan
Women’s 4.0 Doubles: Melissa Aimori/Nozomi Lloyd.
Mixed 4.0 Doubles: Melissa Aimori/Kelly Hai.
Men’s 3.5 Singles: Day Dong Tran.
Women’s 3.5 Singles: 1. Fiona Ma.
Women’s 3.5 Doubles: Vivien Wu/Michelle Zhang.
Mixed 3.5 Doubles: Felicia Liu/Wesmond Cheng.
Men’s 3.0 Singles: Anatolijis Nefjodovs.
Women’s 3.0 Singles: Robin Noice.
Men’s 3.5 Doubles: Charles Go/Jimmie Le.
Women’s 3.0 Doubles: Julie Ross/Kim Short.
Mixed 3.0 Doubles: Iris Antonio/Robert Fuertes.
