Five world titles, one week: what’s at stake in Dallas
The PPA World Championships begin today at Brookhaven. Here's the schedule, the stakes and the five storylines that will decide it.
The team event is over. Now it gets personal. The PPA World Championships run Nov. 2–8 at Brookhaven Country Club in Farmers Branch, Texas, with five titles on the line: men's and women's singles, and men's, women's and mixed doubles.
Worlds is a 3,000-point PPA Major. The tour lists $1,648,641 in total payouts, a figure that includes appearance fees and is not prize money alone.
The schedule
- Monday, Nov. 2: Pro qualifying, free on the PPA Tour YouTube channel.
- Tuesday to Saturday: The main draw, from the round of 64 through the semifinals. Doubles quarterfinals and semifinals are Friday and Saturday evenings.
- Thursday, Nov. 5: The Challenger Showdown begins, with eight 2027 tour contracts at stake, and the celebrity pro-am with Mark Wahlberg airs at 8 p.m. ET on Tennis Channel.
- Sunday, Nov. 8: Championship Sunday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET on PickleballTV.
Five storylines
Anna Leigh Waters, at 200 and counting. Waters won her 200th career PPA title with a triple crown at the Chicago Cup on Oct. 11. The PPA says she is 55-0 in singles finals since June 2022, and 14-0 against Kate Fahey in finals.
Hunter Johnson's fall. Four singles golds since September: Nationals in Cary, the Las Vegas Open (where he beat Ben Johns 11-1, 11-3), Brisbane and the Hong Kong Slam. He is the form player in the men's draw. Our breakdown.
Men's doubles is a three-team race. Johns and Gabe Tardio won Nationals. Christian Alshon and Andrei Daescu won Las Vegas. Then Hayden Patriquin and Federico Staksrud won Chicago and Hong Kong, beating Johns and Tardio 11-6, 11-8 in the Hong Kong final.
The mixed doubles rivalry. Anna Bright and Patriquin beat top seeds Johns and Waters in the Las Vegas final. Johns and Waters answered with golds in Chicago and Hong Kong, the second an 11-4, 11-3 final over Bright and Patriquin. Read more.
The next wave. Kiora Kunimoto, 18, reached the Las Vegas singles final after upsetting top seed Kate Fahey. Roscoe Bellamy won Chicago singles over top seed Christopher Haworth. And eight Challenger Showdown players leave Dallas with tour offers.
Tickets start at $25 a day before fees. Every court streams on PickleballTV.
This story was produced by the Pickleballer news desk under Pickleballer’s standards. See an error? Tell us.