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WINNERS GET FREE TICKET TO DOWNUNDER   
There have been no entry forms (entry has been by invitation), no entry fee, no fliers, no official notification other than a small innocuous notation in the current issue of Squash Magazine and, understandably in light of the foregoing, virtually no entries. But, ready or not, the USSRA will be launching the inaugural edition of the U. S. Softball Doubles Championships, set to take place this weekend in St. Louis, even though as of this writing only two men's teams and two women's are set to participate on the two regulation-sized (same 32-foot length but four feet wider at 25 feet than a regulation softball singles court) courts in St. Louis to vie for this title.

The event takes place in conjunction with the expanded and upgraded St. Louis PSA Pro singles event.

A "TEST" EVENT
Actually, as clarified by USSRA CEO Kevin Klipstein, this weekend's competition will be a "test" national championship, with the winning team members receiving free tickets to Australia, where the world softball doubles championships will be held early next year, and with the hope being that eventually this event will evolve into an official USSRA title on a par with the U. S. National Hardball championships that have been held every year since 1933, other than a three-year hiatus from 1943-45 due to World War II. This year's tourney will also, as noted, serve as a "team trial" for the right to represent the U.
S. in the world tournament in Australia this coming winter.

The four combined team entries contrast starkly with the record-shattering 150-odd teams that effectively engulfed the six New York area host clubs last spring in the U. S. Hardball Doubles tourney, with play lasting past midnight for the first two days of a mammoth four-day extravaganza that ultimately became an enormously successful squash celebration.

THE FIELD
In St. Louis, Michael Puertas of the host club and Jamie Crombie will face Dylan Patterson and Beau River in the men's final, with the Khan sisters, Shebana and Latasha, opposing Meredeth Quick and Louisa Hall in the women's. Crombie, Latasha Khan and Hall all played on the U. S. team in India in the world team event in late 2004, as did Preston Quick, who was invited to play in St. Louis but declined.