First-Ever Latin American Masters Racquetball Association (LAMRA) Tournament Held in Guatemala City

First-Ever Latin American Masters Racquetball Association (LAMRA) Tournament Held in Guatemala City
November 2-5, 2022 at Domo Complejo de Raquetbol, Guatemala City, Guatemala

It was an amazing weekend in Guatemala City! In fact, everyone is “saving the date” for the 2nd Annual LAMRA 40+ Championships in November 2023. The reviews are in, and all of the players and friends had a great time. They loved the round-robin format, back-to-back scheduling, quantity of matches, the banquet, the medals. For Marie Gomar and me, the hard work to set up this first-ever competition was so very gratifying.

But what is this new event? Years ago, after hearing that the 10-court Domo Complejo de Raquetbol was nearing completion in Guatemala City, I knew I had to ask Marie Gomar to help me create an event for the older Spanish-speaking racquetball players. Thankfully, because she and Estuardo Wer love the match format we use for National Masters in the USA, Marie agreed to do all of the hard work, with Estuardo making sure the Guatemala Racquetball Association supported our efforts. So it was a dream and a goal, long before the pandemic, to try to run this event.

We had three countries represented: Guatemala, Honduras and the USA. Ages 40 to 65 competed in singles and doubles, and, as promised, no one was ever eliminated. Even more fun and special was the fact that the Guatemalan kids were off school and they wanted to play a separate pool-play tournament the day before we all started regular LAMRA matches. We had more kids than 40+ players—I’m sure we will change that ratio in 2023! Former World Champion and LPRT #20 Gabriela Martinez stopped by to say hello and let a few LAMRA players challenge her.

As you can imagine, the visitors to the country also took full advantage of Marie Gomar’s hosting skills to sightsee several days. We went to Antigua (ancient city), hiked the Pacaya Volcano, experienced an earthquake, and visited many local restaurants.

We livestreamed many of the matches from the National Masters RB Facebook page—check them out to get an idea of the club and competitors. A big hit all weekend with the junior players was the Oculus Quest and the Racket:NX virtual reality game. There was always someone playing spacedome racquetball that only they were seeing. Check it out at racketnext.com. It makes a great gift for any racquet sport fan in your life.

I want to thank all of the special people who made the event possible. Estuardo Wer and the Guatemala Racquetball Association was so wonderful to support the Guatemalans in the event. The Hondurans drove eight hours to join us...and Daniel Mancia had an extra flight from Michigan, too. Janice Vosika flew all day to be there. The Guatemalan Junior players were so sweet to play with us on Wednesday. Juan Salvatierra set up all of the pools for the Wednesday tournament. Erny Escobar arranged for printing and managed the club. Domo Complejo de Raquetbol didn’t charge us for court time rental. And the National Masters Racquetball Association shared the format, R2Sports tournament software usage, and financial support for the tournament—we were kind of the doting parent of the LAMRA tournament.

And of course, Marie Gomar did all of the hard work AND hosted us Americans the entire time. She chose the jackets, designed the medals and logo, arranged for the food, set up the Friday dinner, helped do all of the computer work, helped arrange the Junior event, solved all of the problems, interpreted all of the conversations, sent out the WhatsApp updates, took the photos, and ran the tournament desk. I’m sure she had no idea how much time would be required when she committed to running the tournament with me a year ago. It was a great team, and we are very proud of the result. I believe Marie plans to have more round-robin, self-refereed tournaments at the club in the coming months.

Check out the results on R2Sports https://www.r2sports.com/tourney/viewResults.asp?TID=39841. Mark your calendars (tentatively) for November 2-4, 2023 Bring your racquetball friends next year! Call me or Marie any time if you have suggestions or questions.

Here’s a P.S. from Marie Gomar: Cindy Tilbury doesn’t give herself credit for all that she did to get this first LAMRA event into the record books. Truly, all of the tasks described in the article were performed mainly by Cindy, with me just assisting and learning from the best! Thank you deeply, Cindy, for your dream and for all your hard work!

Photos courtesy of Marie Gomar/LAMRA