Sakai Undefeated at Hammer Heads
Ladies Spirit Tour / Holiday, FL
by Rick Davis
Japan’s Miyuki Sakai blew away the 46-player field at Hammer Heads in Holiday, FL, to go undefeated during her reign at the Ladies Spirit Tour’s third tour stop of the 2007 season April 28-29.
On the winners’ side the top four faced off as tour regular Stephanie Mitchell defeated the winner of the last stop, Debbie Schjodt, double-hill. Also, Sakai sliced through the winner of the first event, Jeannie Seaver, 7-4. In the hot seat match Mitchell kept things close, although Sakai was too strong and ultimately defeated Mitchell 7-5.
Over on the one-loss side Dawn Fox was putting together a nice comeback, taking four one-loss match wins, including a 7-1 thrashing against Jessica Barnes, until she was stopped dead by Schjodt 7-2. In that same round Seaver kept herself in the action, eliminating Tamara Redemakers 7-3 to meet Schjodt in the quarterfinals.
With only three matches remaining Seaver ousted Schjodt 7-5 in the quarterfinals but was then knocked out herself 7-3 by Mitchell in the semifinals. With the finals a rematch of the hot seat match the score kept close for the final time. This time around a thrilling double-hill score was reached before Sakai closed out the match with the final rack.
Results:
1st Miyuki Sakai
2nd Stephanie Mitchell
3rd Jeannie Seaver
4th Debbie Schjodt
5th Dawn Fox
Tamara Redemakers
7th Jessica Barnes
Ellen Van Buren