Liang Xu won the Knoxville Spring Giant Round Robin Open 2016

The Knoxville Table Tennis Club (KTTC) hosted its first tournament in 2016.  The Knoxville Spring Giant Round Robin was hosted on May 7th at the home club of KTTC.  The tournament uses a format where 36 players are divided into two separate divisions, Upper and Lower division.  For each division, there are two groups of nine players who battle in a giant round robin format.  The top two of each group will advance to play a cross-over semi-finals and final.

The format creates more intense competitions for each division and allows the players to play many matches to get their money worth.

Players from Georgia and Tennessee are competing for a prize money pool of $600 spread among two divisions.  There are quite a few upsets and memorable experiences are gained by first time tournament players as well as seasoned tournament veterans.  In the end, Liang Xu (2448 Rating) from Atlanta, GA defeats John Mar (2220 Rating) from Atlanta, GA 3 – 1 to conclude the Upper division competition.

In the Lower division, Gobinath Ramaraj from Nashville defeats Michael Fang from Knoxville in a 3 – 2 five-game thriller to claim the division title.

The Knoxville Table Tennis Club would like to thank all the players who had participated in the tournament.  KTTC would also like to thank the sponsors Newgy Industries, Horizon Avionics, and ZeroPong.com and all the volunteers who have made the event a successful one.

We will also be hosting our second tournament in 2016 on September 10th.  The tournament information can be found here. KTTC will love to see every one at our September tournament again.

Jude Lam, President of KTTC