by Suzanne Smith

The weekend of August 15-16 was a great one for competition at the Northwest Women’s Pool Association’s fifth tour stop of the season, hosted by The Parlor in Bellevue, WA. Twenty-six women came out to fight for the title and the tour’s last WPBA qualifier of 2009, with Tamara Rademakers edging out the victory.

In the winners’ side final four, the top two players on the tour, Liz Cole and Cindy Sliva, matched up, while Mary Olson went head to head with Suwanna Kroll. Cole prevailed 7-2, while Kroll won 7-1 to advance to the hot seat match to play each other, where Cole continued her streak with a 7-3 win to rest in the hot seat.

Now on the one-loss side, Kroll went up against Rademakers, who had been working her way through the chart, in the semifinals. A decisive 7-1 win gave Rademakers a chance at the final match, with Kroll taking home third place, her best finish yet on the tour.

Cole had already dealt Rademakers one loss already and was prepared to do so again in the single race-to-9 finals. But after the score was knotted at 3, Rademakers surged ahead to take a 7-3 lead. The players split the next two racks, and then Cole caught her second wind and managed to make it a hill-hill final battle. When Cole missed a 7-9 carom, Rademakers was ready to go, and she pocketed the final three balls to earn the title and the qualifier.

The weekend of August 15-16 was a great one for competition at the Northwest Women’s Pool Association’s fifth tour stop of the season, hosted by The Parlor in Bellevue, WA.

Results:
1st Tamara Rademakers $405 + qualifier
2nd Liz Cole $265
3rd Suwanna Kroll $170
4th Cindy Sliva $130
5th Elizabeth Jensen $80
Mary Olson
7th Mikki Small $60
Julie Valdez