A total of three maiden champions were crowned on the ATP Challenger Tour last week–Gijs Brouwer, Naoki Nakagawa, Valentin Royer. Especially the Japanese was a bit of a shocker with a 4-29 Challenger main draw record coming into this week. The other winners were much more familiar–Jaume Munar won a title for the 8th season in a row, while Juan Pablo Ficovich is consistently one of the best altitude clay performers. Read up on last week’s action:
Bad Waltersdorf
Thiago Seyboth Wild took the clay Challengers route post-US Open and after poor performances in Genoa and Szczecin, it didn’t seem like he was going to get the points he was banking on. But the Brazilian picked himself up in time with a three-set win over Dmitry Popko in the opening round. From that point onwards we saw a completely different version of his game as he steamrolled past his next three opponents without getting broken.
Jaume Munar was recently in the Genoa final and suffered a quick loss in Szczecin right after that. A few days of break allowed him to gather up his energy again with the Spaniard fighting back from a set down against Tomas Barrios Vera in the opening round in Bad Waltersdorf. He then pushed past Dennis Novak and Matej Dodig with ease before running into a firing Nicolas Moreno de Alboran in the semifinals. The win took almost three hours with Munar saving three match points to take it 5-7 7-6(10) 6-1.
And yet after these three hours spent on court against Moreno de Alboran, Munar looked pretty fresh as he routined Seyboth Wild on Sunday. The Brazilian just kept overhitting against his strong defending and didn’t really pose that much of a challenge. Munar claimed his 10th Challenger title 6-2 6-1 and won a trophy at this level for the 8th year straight. These points should be enough for him to secure a Top 100 finish and the 27-year-old will be back to hard courts after a week of rest in Shanghai. Seyboth Wild is still in the draw in Lisbon before he’ll also head to that ATP 1000.
Saint-Tropez
Lucas Pouille has been looking dangerous again of late, making the Rennes quarterfinal and barely losing to Constant Lestienne. That set him up nicely for Saint-Tropez, where he had to be regarded as one of the favorites to take the title. The Frenchman got off to a great start, beating some fellow veterans like Liam Broady and Kamil Majchrzak while also eliminating the top seed Duje Ajdukovic in the quarterfinals. Only the Croat took him to a tie-break on the way to the final.
If Pouille was an expected finalist, the run of Gijs Brouwer came as a big surprise. The Dutchman had only picked up one win in his last six events and had to start from the qualifying draw. Luckily for him, he speedrunned through the first four matches and didn’t waste any energy. Brouwer needed it for his quarterfinal clash with Benjamin Bonzi, which saw him save two match points at 4-5 in the 3rd set before winning 7-5. He later beat Ugo Blanchet to make his second Challenger final, first since May 2022 in Tunis.
Pouille seemed like a bit of a lock to win the final with how he had been playing all week, but Brouwer stepped up to take the game to him. It took the Frenchman all the way until 4-6 3-5 to finally break on his 9th opportunity. It was to no avail though as Brouwer was much stronger in the tie-break and ended up claiming his 1st Challenger title 6-4 7-6 to return to the Top 200. He withdrew from Antofagasta and will stay in Europe instead (but won’t be back for a week), while Pouille is heading straight to the indoor courts in Orleans.
Columbus
James Kent Trotter was very familiar with the venue with the tournament being played on the courts of his alma mater, Ohio State. Slick indoor conditions are something he very much enjoys as well. The Japanese defeated Aidan Mayo from a set down in the opening round before posting a couple of one tie-break wins over Patrick Zahraj and Ernesto Escobedo. The key to this final run was how he beat Nishesh Basavareddy though, taking 12 of the last 13 games.
Naoki Nakagawa had never made a Challenger quarterfinal before Columbus with a 4-29 main draw record at this level. That included just one match in 2024 with an opening-round loss in Las Vegas. That didn’t stop him from beating a very strong set of opponents with Jack Pinnington Jones or Kyle Edmund, but especially top seed and World No. 116 Christopher Eubanks. Top 10 junior years back (won 2014 US Open doubles with Omar Jasika) broke new ground a decade later.
The 12th all-Japanese final in ATP Challenger Tour history ended up being a massive battle. Nakagawa sort of stole the opening set and on the quick courts at Ohio State, it always felt like Trotter had the upper hand, even if just slightly. But his opponent kept giving it his all and was always there to turn defense into offense. It all resulted in a 3h clash with Nakagawa taking it 7-6(8) 5-7 7-6(5), hitting the line with the last forehand. The very unexpected champion will find himself just one spot behind his career-high at No. 335 and along with Trotter, will appear in Charleston thanks to a special exempt.
Cali
Gonzalo Bueno won two Challenger titles earlier in 2024 (Buenos Aires and Concepcion), but slowed down considerably later with just one quarterfinal across eleven events going into Cali. The key win here was the second round against one of the biggest altitude specialists and top seed Thiago Agustin Tirante. Bueno almost went down a double break in the deciding set, recovering from 0-40 from 1-3 down to then take the last five games and win the match.
Juan Pablo Ficovich often excels in altitude conditions himself, including the Bogota title in 2022 and the Merida final earlier this year. This season he also finished runner-up in Concepcion, where he also faced Bueno in the final. In Cali Ficovich produced a wild run of four deciding set wins in a row, impressing especially in the 5-7 6-1 7-5 win over the recent Iasi/Liberec/Bonn champion Hugo Dellien. That was the only third set the Argentinian had any issues in.
Bueno had dismantled Ficovich in the final in Concepcion, but at altitude this was going to be a completely different challenge. The Peruvian had issues controlling his shots on the day too and just didn’t deliver a performance of the required standard. Ficovich’s aggressive game payoff is much greater in conditions like this and he claimed his 3rd Challenger title 6-1 6-4. He will try to keep at it in Antofagasta this week, while Bueno takes some rest and sits out a week before returning in Buenos Aires.
Sibiu
Valentin Royer made it to the quarterfinals in Dobrich the week before Sibiu, losing to Genaro Alberto Olivieri. To progress into the semifinals here, he needed to beat the very same opponent. But that wasn’t even the toughest win of Royer this week with his battle against fellow young Frenchman Arthur Gea being the most entertaining in the second round. The 23-year-old made his 2nd Challenger final after losing in Tunis to Oriol Roca Batalla in May.
This is a breakthrough campaign for Luka Pavlovic, who has not only posted a 3-2 record in finals on the ITF Tour, but also made his first Challenger run in Todi recently with the highlight being a three-and-a-half-hour loss to Carlos Taberner. The Challenger 50 level was a perfect bridge for Pavlovic to continue that rise and with impressive wins over Rudolf Molleker or Cezar Cretu, he was able to make his first Challenger final without dropping a set.
A title for Royer had been in the making for a while and he handled the occasion much better than on his first attempt in Tunis. Pavlovic could keep up with him for the first eight games, but once the match turned on its head the shift was just unstoppable. Royer got going and won 26 points to 13 in the second set, claiming his 1st Challenger title 6-4 6-0. He secured a career-high ranking of No. 182 and will rest for a week before returning in Villena. Meanwhile, Pavlovic took the special exempt opportunity in Lisbon.
Events held this week:
- Co’Met Orleans Open (Challenger 125, indoor hard)
- Challenger Dove Men+Care Antofagasta (Challenger 100, clay)
- Bangkok Challenger (Nonthaburi, Challenger 100, hard)
- Del Monte Lisboa Belem Open (Lisbon, Challenger 100, clay)
- LTP Challenger (Charleston, Challenger 75, hard)
Top 100 players in action:
- Quentin Halys (Orleans)
- Camilo Ugo Carabelli (Antofagasta)
- Arthur Cazaux, Adam Walton (Nonthaburi)
- Thiago Monteiro, Daniel Altmaier, Thiago Seyboth Wild, Thiago Agustin Tirante (Lisbon)
First-round matches to watch:
Orleans
- Kamil Majchrzak vs (5) Harold Mayot
- (4) Luca Van Assche vs Borna Gojo
- Benjamin Hassan vs (2) Denis Shapovalov
Antofagasta
- (1) Camilo Ugo Carabelli vs Alvaro Guillen Meza
- Enzo Couacaud vs (3) Jesper de Jong
Lisbon
- (1) Thiago Monteiro vs Matej Dodig
- Henrique Rocha vs (3) Thiago Seyboth Wild
Nonthaburi
- Khumoyun Sultanov vs Dan Evans
- Yu-hsiou Hsu vs (2) Adam Walton
Charleston
- Ethan Quinn vs (9) Brandon Holt
- (5) Denis Kudla vs Bernard Tomic
Main Photo Credit: Geoff Burke-USA TODAY Sports
