Last year's Q Dubs

Ahead of the qualifying rounds at the International Racquetball Tour's (IRT) Motorola Racquetball World Championships, The Racquetball Blog is reviewing last year's qualifier wins, or Q Dubs. We introduced this statistic last season, and it refers to wins by a qualifier in the main draw (round of 16 and on) by a player who's come through the qualifying.

Of 12 IRT main events in 2008-09, there were 0 QWs in four of them, 1 QW in three tournaments, 2 QWs in one tournament, 3 in another one, but there were 4 QWs in one event and 5 in two others. Kane Waselenchuk was primarily responsible for those 5 QWs and the 4.

In the first three events of last season Waselenchuk was a qualifier, and he won each of those tournaments (4 wins each). In the first two, Jason Thoerner also won a match, so there were five QWs at last season's Motorola Racquetball World Championships and Kansas Open.

The mean number of QWs per IRT event was 1.83 (22 QWs in 12 events) last season compared with 0.92 the season before. (note: the US Open qualifying is for an earlier round of the draw than in other IRT events, so that event is not included in the QW count). However, if you remove Waselenchuk's wins from the total then the mean is 0.83 (10 QWs in 12 events), which is approximately the same as the 2007-08 season.

Waselenchuk had the most QWs last season with 12. Five other players had two QWs: Chris Crowther, Andy Hawthorne, Jason Thoerner, Javier Moreno, and Jose Rojas, who was the only qualifier to twice - i.e. reach the semi-finals at an event.

For the second season, Chris Crowther was most often on the losing end of QWs (QLs we might call them, or Q Ells). He lost four times to qualifiers (once to Waselenchuk). Alvaro Beltran and Rocky Carson had three QLs, but their losses were all to Waselenchuk. Ben Croft and Shane Vanderson also had three QLs, losing once to Waselenchuk and twice more to other qualifiers.

Jason Mannino had two qualifier losses, as did Jack Huczek, but both of Huczek's were to Waselenchuk while neither of Mannino's were.

Qualifier Wins (QWs) by event - IRT 2008-09 Season

5 - Motorola World Racquetball Championship (Denver) - Kane Waselenchuk d. Ben Croft, Waselenchuk d. Jack Huczek, Waselenchuk d. Alvaro Beltran, Waselenchuk d. Rocky Carson, Jason Thoerner d. Chris Crowther
5 - Kansas Open - Kane Waselenchuk d. Rocky Carson, Waselenchuk d. Jason Thoerner, Waselenchuk d. Alvaro Beltran, Waselenchuk d. Jack Huczek, Jason Thoerner d. Chris Crowther
4 - Kentucky Pro-Am - Kane Waselenchuk d. Shane Vanderson, Waselenchuk d. Chris Crowther, Waselenchuk d. Rocky Carson, Waselenchuk d. Alvaro Beltran
0 - Canadian Classic
0* US Open - (note: different tournament format)
1 - Juarez Open - Javier Moreno d. Shane Vanderson
2 - California Open - Jose Rojas d. Jason Mannino, Jose Rojas d. Shane Vanderson
0 - New York City Pro Am
0 - Seattle Open
1 - San Diego Open - Chris Crowther d. Ben Croft
0 - Sarasota - Florida Spring Break
1 - Allentown - Andy Hawthorne d. Chris Crowther
3 - Pro Nationals - Andy Hawthorne d. Mitch Williams, Javier Moreno d. Jason Mannino, Chris Crowther d. Ben Croft

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