Carson USTA Women’s $50,000 Challenger To Be Contested at Carson’s Home Depot Center

Written by: Staff on 20th May 2011

Carson USTA Women's $50,000 Challenger To Be Contested at Carson's Home Depot Center |

USTA Women’s $50,000 Challenger To Be

Contested at Carson’s Home Depot Center

Led by Second-Seeded Alexa Glatch, Two Others From SoCal Will Appear As

Top 8 Seeds Next Week in the South Bay’s Biggest Professional Tennis Event

CARSON, Calif., (Friday, May 20, 2011) – Three women’s professional tennis players with Southern California ties have secured spots among the top eight seeded players for the upcoming Carson USTA Women’s $50,000 Challenger presented by the Farmers Classic starting with qualifying this Saturday and concluding with the finals on Sunday, May 29.

All the action will take place for the fifth consecutive year at the Home Depot Center in Carson. Unlike in past years when Carson was one of the only USTA Challengers where both the men and women competed at the same time and same venue, this year’s tournament will see only the women participate. This is the USTA Pro Circuit’s first hardcourt event of 2011 and the only $50,000 California event on the year’s calendar.

Alexa Glatch, 21, of Newport Beach is the No. 2-seeded player behind top-seeded Italy’s Camila Giorgi, who holds down a No. 197 WTA world singles ranking. Glatch, at No. 202, was the 2005 U.S. Open girls’ singles and doubles finalist and reached the quarterfinals at the WTA event in Memphis, Tenn., earlier this year as a qualifier. In 2008, she was a finalist at Carson falling to Mashona Washington in the final.

American Ashley Weinhold (No. 254) will be the No. 3 seeded player followed by Julia Boserup, who grew up in Cheviot Hills just 25 miles northwest of Carson. Boserup is a 19-year-old who now trains with former touring pro Eliot Teltscher. She has recently cracked the world Top 300 and sits at No. 298. As a junior, Boserup won the 2008 Dunlop Orange Bowl and as a pro advanced to the semifinals of the $25,000 event in Jackson, Miss, earlier this year.

Santa Ana’s Krista Hardebeck (No. 336) will be seeded No. 7. Other top Americans among the main draw entries include former USC All-American Amanda Fink, Jennifer Elie, Alexandra Mueller, Asia Muhammad, Megan Falcon, Lena Litvak, Jessica Pegula, Macall Harkins, former UCLA star Yasmin Schnack, Amanda McDowell, Brittany Augustine and Jan Abaza.

“The Carson Challenger will again be a highly competitive event that shows off some of not only Southern California, but also the nation’s top women’s players,” said John Lansville, tournament director. “This year a lot of the top American players have decided to go over to Europe to play so this gives a lot of other young players an opportunity to grab some valuable ranking points.”

Teenagers receiving main draw wild cards include: 14-year-old Gabrielle Andrews of nearby Pomona, who reached the final of the 2011 Easter Bowl and won the doubles title, as well as swept both the singles and doubles titles at the 2010 USTA Girls’ 18s Winter National Championships; 16-year-old Samantha Crawford, who trains full-time at the USTA Training Center Headquarters in Boca Raton, Fla., and won the 2011 USTA

International Spring Championships as a junior player; 17-year-old Grace Min, who reached the singles final of the 2010 Dunlop Orange Bowl in December 2010; and 18-year-old Shelby Rogers, who won a pre-qualifying tournament early last year to earn a qualifying wild card into the Family Circle Cup in Charleston, S.C., on the WTA tour, and who advanced to her first USTA Pro Circuit final at last year’s $50,000 event in Indian Harbour Beach, Fla.

For more information on the tournament log onto the website at www.usta.com/carsonchallenger.