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Carol climbs up to No. 208
Carol Lee stretches for a return during her and Steven Goodwin’s doubles match against Jeff Race and Isabel Heras in last year’s TanHoldings Tennis Classic at the Fiesta Resort & Spa Saipan courts. Lee is now ranked No. 208 in the world. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)
Carol Lee is nearing her ultimate goal of making it to the Top 200 in the ITF Juniors world ranking after rising to No. 208 following her quarterfinals appearance in both the singles and doubles events of the 2017 Oceania Closed Junior Championships.
The 15-year-old Lee, who aimed to reach the Top 200 before ending her junior tennis career, started the Oceania Closed held early this month at the Regional Training Center in Lautoka, Fiji ranked No. 240 and jumped 32 notches after winning a pair of games in the singles event and one match in the doubles.
The Commonwealth player, who had already surpassed her target to making it to the Top 300 at the end of the year, defeated Grace Schumacher of Australia in the first round, 6-3, 6-0, and topped New Zealand’s Elys Saguil-Ventura in similar scores in the Round of 16 to advance to the quarterfinals. Australia’s Megan Smith then ended Lee’s streak with a 6-4, 1-6, 6-3 victory in the quarterfinals. With Lee making it to the Round of 8, she gained 40 ranking points—the most she earned since joining the ITF Juniors Circuit. The Oceania Close is a B2 tournament or the fourth highest in the circuit and the ranking points Lee got in the competition brought her total to 170 (singles only).
In the doubles, Lee was awarded 25 after she and Oleksandra Kalachova of New Zealand defeated Australia’s Isabella Bozicevic and Helena Spiridis in the first round, 6-2, 6-3. Lee and Kalachiva then bowed to Smith and Roopa Bains in the quarterfinals, 6-7 (4), 1-6. The CNMI player now has 125 doubles ranking points and 201.25 combined points.
With over four months left in the season, Lee still has a chance to gain more ranking points and hit her target early as she is scheduled to join the Asian Tennis Federation Touring Team that will compete in Malaysia and Thailand in October.
