Carol climbs up anew in rankings

Carol Lee is seen here competing in the CNMI-hosted ITF Juniors ranking event in May this year. She just completed two tournaments in New Zealand and is now ranked No. 464 in the world. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)

Carol Lee moved sixth notches higher in the ITF Juniors world ranking as results of her games in the ITF Waikato-Bays Under 18s Championships in New Zealand were counted last week.

From No. 470 after her stint in the Auckland ITF Indoor Championships 2016, the 14-year-old Lee is now at No. 464 as she made it to the quarterfinals of the singles and semis of the doubles event in the ITF Waikato-Bays competition held in East Hamilton held from Oct. 3 to 8.

Lee was awarded 10 points for advancing to the Round of 8 in the singles event of the Grade 5 tournament and gained additional 10 as she and Palau’s Ayana Rengiil barged into the Final Four of the same contest. The Commonwealth bet defeated Australia’s Natala Ilic, 6-1, 6-4, and New Zealand’s Cayla Mc Inroy, 6-0, 6-1, before bowing to Australia’s Ivan Popovic, 5-7, 2-6, in the singles quarterfinals. In the doubles, Lee and Rengiil defeated Japan’s Asuka Kata and Australia’s Gabriella Ioannou, 7-6 (5), 1-6, 10-8 Japan’s Sophie Hamada and New Zealand’s Sophie Michl, 6-0, 6-1, to march in the semis. The Pacific Oceania pair went on to drop its semis match over Chiara Di Tommaso and Ivana Popovic, 2-6, 1-6.

With the results of her tournaments in New Zealand all in, Lee now holds a career singles record of 27-15 and 13-14 in doubles. For this season, she has a 19-8 slate in singles and 9-7 in doubles. She then improved her ranking points a bit in the doubles (5 more) for the combined ranking points of 118.75 (105 in singles). She had 117.50 points after the tournament in Auckland and was ranked No. 499 before she participated in the two off-island competitions.

Despite her rise in the world ranking, Lee said she still has a long ways to go to achieve her goal.

“Even though I moved up 464, it is not enough for me. I want to be at about Top 200. So I’m not feeling too good or too bad about it for now,” Lee said.

To move closer to her goal, the reigning NMSA Female Student Athlete of the Year said she will continue training and look for a few more tournaments before the year ends.

“I will be training in Fiji for about a month and then come back on Saipan for two weeks before I leave again for the Philippines next month for another ITF Juniors event,” Lee said.

The CNMI junior players was ranked as high as No. 443 in July this year after her semis and finals appearances in tournaments in Fiji and New Caledonia.