Jack Kramer Club Archives - Tennis Grandstand

Kaylan Bigun waited a little longer than expected to win his first ITF pro singles title two weeks ago at the opening week Lakewood SoCal Pro Series event. The former UCLA standout didn’t have to wait long for his second title as the top-seeded 20-year-old beat Jack Kramer Club member Andy Johnson, 6-1, 7-5, on Sunday.

It was a boisterous crowd of approximately 375 cheering on the 16-year-old Johnson, ranked among the top junior players in the world. The electric atmosphere seemed to increase as the match went on as Johnson overcame an 0-5 deficit in the first set to keep the fans on the edge of their seats and rooting for more.

Watch his post-match interview with Randy Walker here Kaylan Bigun Talks After Winning Jack Kramer Club USTA SoCal Pro Circuit Event https://youtu.be/tjY57x-wpdo?si=YmGftq6Z9KOaoNV1 via @YouTube

Bigun said his dad told him after the match that the Kramer Club was the site of his first tournament title growing up on the Westside of Los Angeles as a young junior. “I didn’t really remember it, but it’s all starting to come back now,” said Bigun, who is entered into the Week 4 of the USTA Southern California Pro Circuit $15,000 event that begins Monday at the Racquet Club of Irvine. “You’ve seen Southern California guys go through these tournaments in the past and do well and build some momentum.”

Although he wasn’t named, Bigun may have been speaking specifically of another talented SoCal lefty who is also 20 years old in Irvine’s Learner Tien. Two summers ago, Tien used the SoCal Pro Series as a springboard to greater things winning four of the events and then two M75 Challengers and is now among the top 20 players in the world rankings.

Bigun, who won the Roland Garros junior title in 2024 and was the No. 1-ranked junior in the world at the end of that year, jumped out to a quick 5-0 lead against the No. 5 seeded Johnson, who was backed by the loud Kramer Club crowd. It was the first meeting for the two in an official match, but they practice together a lot at the USTA Training Center in Carson.

“To be honest, I like playing in front of crowds so it didn’t bother me,” said Bigun, who served for the match at 5-4 in the second set only to see Johnson play three great points to hold his serve and extend the match.

During the trophy presentation, Kramer Club General Manager and tournament director Peter Smith congratulated Bigun. “You not only faced a tough player in Andy, but also all of the Kramer Club members,” Smith said. “You are a great player and you showed a lot of class out there today.”

Besides the club members, Johnson’s friend and family members cheered him on. Also there was his coach since he was 4 years old Vasile Beches, a Bucharest, Romanian native who teaches out of the South End Racquet Club in Torrance.

“It definitely helped me,” said Johnson, who will next play Roehampton J300 on grass before heading to Wimbledon. “They kept pushing me and I wanted to keep the match going because they were being so great and supportive.”

In the women’s singles final, it was a battle of two qualifiers who were each playing their sixth match in as many days as Russia’s Alina Shcherbinina edged out South Carolina senior Kaitlyn Carnicella, 6-0, 6-7(4), 7-5. Shcherbinina, 22, played at Baylor before finishing at Oklahoma and had never been past a quarterfinals in an ITF event, falling three times in the round of eight.

In 2022 during the first year of the SoCal Pro Series, Shcherbinina played in five of the tournaments losing in the quarterfinals at the Kramer Club event to 14-year-old Iva Jovic from Torrance, a wild card who went on to make the final in her pro debut.

“I remember she was 14 and I knew nothing about her,” said Shcherbinina, who lost the match 6-1, 6-1. “She played so well and you knew she was going to be a regular on the tour.”

In the men’s doubles final New Zealand’s Reece Falck and Billy Suarez (Tulane) beat the top seeds Christopher Papa (Pepperdine/San Diego Christina) and Lambert Ruland from Germany, 7-5, 6-4. In the women’s doubles final, it was a battle of No. 1 vs. No.2 as the American pairing of Capucine Jauffret and Kristina Penickova eked past top-seeded Salma Ewing (USC) and Alexandra Vagramov (UCLA), 4-6, 6-2, 10-8.

To learn more about the SoCal Pro Series, go to socalproseries.com.
Follow along on Instagram at instagram.com/socalproseries.
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Former ATP World Tour ranked tennis professionals and aspiring competitive players age 40 and over are invited to participate in a special senior prize money tennis tournament March 1-4 at the Jack Kramer Tennis Club in Rolling Hills Estates, Calif., 20 miles from downtown Los Angeles.

The Jack Kramer Club Past Masters Challenge will feature a 40-and-over singles tournament and a 50-and-over doubles tournament with prize money being awarded to singles and doubles semifinalists, finalists and champions. Prize money amounts will be determined based on a prize money pot that will be made up of tournament entry fees as well as fees raised through tournament competitors participating in pro-am, hit-with-the-pros sessions with patrons.

Former Top 50 professional 2000 U.S. Olympic team member Jeff Tarango, the new director of tennis at the Kramer Club, will be playing and hosting the event.

Players who ranked in the top 50 of the ATP singles rankings in their careers who enter the event will receive a bye into the singles semifinals of the event and if there are more than three who enter, they will receive a bye into the quarterfinals or another appropriate round based on the number of players of this level entered into the event. Former top 20 doubles players and their partners will be accorded the same in the doubles competition. All other entries, whether former ATP ranked players who did not receive a top 50 singles ranking or top 20 doubles ranking or are an aspiring competitive tournament players who did not receive a world ranking, will compete in a feed-in draw. ALL ENTRIES FOR ANY PLAYER WHO MEET AGE REQUIREMENTS WILL BE ACCEPTED. THIS IS AN OPEN TOURNAMENT.Matches will be best-of-three FAST4 sets (first to four games, tie-breaker at 3-3, no-ad scoring)

“This is a fascinating grass roots effort to create some competitive playing opportunities for money for former ATP touring professionals,” said Tarango, who reached a career high singles ranking of No. 42 in 1992. “It’s very appropriate that we are hosting an event like this at the Jack Kramer Club as Kramer was perhaps the premier pro tennis promoter and many of the early pro events that he played in and later promoted had the competing players dividing portions of the profits of the event. I look forward to seeing many players competing at the Jack Kramer Club in March and hope that more of these type of events can be hosted in the future.”

To sign up for the event, go to this link: https://campscui.active.com/orgs/TennisGrandStand?orglink=camps-registration

Entries will close on Friday, February 23. Former Top 100 ranked ATP singles players will have entry fees waived if they participate in at least one one-hour pro-am, clinic or hit with the pros opportunity with amateurs or pay $95 “ante” entry fee to compete in the singles event. For all other entrants (whether former ATP ranked singles, doubles players or tournament players who did not earn ATP rankings), the entry fee (or “ante”) is $95 for singles and $150 per doubles team and players must be available to participate in at least one one-hour pro-am, clinic or hit-with-the-pros session.

Amateurs who would like to play in the one-hour pro-am, clinic or hit-with-the pros sessions will cost $90, which includes admission to the club for the day and admission to watch the matches. To sign up, click here: https://campscui.active.com/orgs/TennisGrandStand?orglink=camps-registration

All entry fees and pro-am fees go into a “prize money pot” that will be used to award prize money to the singles and doubles players. The more tournament entries there are and the most pro-am players there are, the more then prize money will be, so participating players are encouraged to promote and market the event themselves, encourage fellow players to enter the tournament or participate in the hit-with-the-pros events.

The prize money breakdown is as follows:

Singles winner (40-and-over): 15 percent of the “pot” and runner-up gets 7.5 percent

Singles semifinalists get 4 percent of the “pot”

Doubles winner (50-and-over): 10 percent (split) of the “pot” and runner-up splits 5 percent

Doubles semifinalists split 2 percent of the “pot” each

Remaining portion of the pot goes to administrative fees, costs, the club/promoter

Schedule of Play

Thursday, March 1

Opening round singles and doubles matches starting at Noon (special requests for match times will be considered)

Friday, March 2

Second day of singles and doubles matches starting at Noon (special requests for match times will be considered, flexible)

Pro-Am/Hit-with-Pros/Clinic can be scheduled if needed

Saturday, March 3

Pro-Am/Hit-with-Pros/Clinic at 11 am

Doubles semifinals starting at noon (simultaneously or one after another) and final to follow at about 3 pm (FAST4 sets, can be flexible)

Third day of singles matches, quarterfinal matches to start at 1 pm or so (flexible)

Sunday, March 4

Pro-Am/Hit-with-Pros/Clinic at 11 am

Singles semifinals starting at noon (simultaneously or one after another) and final to follow at about 3 pm (FAST4 sets, can be flexible)

Founded in 1962 during the golden era of tennis by legendary tennis player and promoter Jack Kramer and famed tennis coach Vic Braden, the Jack Kramer Club was the created to be a hub for developing tennis champions in a family focused club environment. The club features 13 tennis courts, a fitness center, an Olympic swimming pool and an iconic South Bay clubhouse. The club was focused on building tennis champions and succeeded as Pete Sampras, Tracy Austin, Lindsay Davenport, Eliot Teltscher among others.

Jack Kramer Club

Kaylan Bigun Wins Jack Kramer Club USTA SoCal Pro Series Title

Former ATP Pros, Senior Aspirants Invited To Compete at Jack Kramer Club in Los Angeles March 1-4