Kim Holder to defend her title in Touch of Class final

Defending Champion, Kim Holder, cruised into the final of the Barbados Public Workers Co-operative Credit Union (BPWCCU) Touch of Class Women’s Road Tennis Tournament.

The tournament, which is being held in honour of Veta Batson, continued on Monday at the Deighton ‘Pa Roach’ Road Tennis Facility in Bush Hall, and Holder easily moved past Rachel Smith in the A Class semi-finals.

Smith played some impressive shots in her defeat, but Holder was equal to the task of her every reply. If Smith had met anyone else in the semis, she may have been an easy winner and through to the finals, but it was Holder who weathered the storm when Smith came back to level the scores at 11-11, to move away for the victory in the first game.

The major downfall of Smith came when she started to spoil the ball and then lost her composure, which led to more spoils. Not even a change of footwear after the first game could stave off Holder’s charge to the final.

Smith once again fought back to level the scores at 11-11, after being down as much as 9-3.

But once again, Holder answered with some impressive passing shots, and Smith again got frustrated and started spoiling after seeing the shots. As a result, Holder went on a 10-1 run to close out the game and the match winner, 21-14, 21-12.

In the other semi-finals, Abigail Haynes came from a game down to defeat the favoured Sheldene Walrond. Haynes, with Julian’ Michael Jackson’ White in her corner, had gone down rather easily in the first game 15-21, and was looking to be the more winded of the two players in the second game. Despite this, she jumped out to an impressive six-point lead, and never looked back, though at times having to walk away to catch her breath.

Walrond was always fighting from behind, as Haynes attacked at every opportunity that presented itself, and though her aggressive punches were taking loads of energy out of her, she never stopped sending them.

Haynes took the second game 21-17.

The third game was similar to the second, where Haynes jumped out to a lead and had Walrond fighting from behind. The attacking shots were not as many, as both players took a slightly cautious approach in this game, but Haynes took home the victory and a berth in the final on Saturday.

Following in her mother’s footsteps was Kyana Holder, who defeated Denise Collymore 21-11, 18-21, 21-15 to book her place in the B Class final, where she will face off against Asabi Downey, who, after just a few weeks of playing the game, has made it to the final. Downey defeated Giselle Fields 21-17, 21-19.

Winning the Doubles Shot Gun was the team of Sheldene Walrond and Rachel Smith, who defeated Sandra Bailey and Esterphyne Lashley 21-18.

Third place went to the mother and daughter team of Kim and Kyana Holder.