Accustomed since she was little to long tours abroad, even living for a long time in the United States, Maria Lourdes Carlé begins to taste the fruits of several seasons of effort and sacrifices. The player born in Daireaux, in the province of Buenos Aires, won the WTA 125 category title on Sunday, the most important of her career to date, by defeating the Spanish Rebeka Masarova in the final of the La Bisbal D’Empordá tournament. by 3-6, 6-1 and 6-2.
The victory in Spain allowed Carlé, 24 years old, to climb 14 positions and reach the best ranking of his career this Monday: As of today, she is ranked 84th in the WTA Tour weekly rankings. In concrete terms, there is an extra prize: in just over a month and a half, will be able to play in the main draw at Roland Garros for the first time in their career, with entry assured by ranking. Thus, after 15 years, there will be two Argentines in the main draw of the Parisian Grand Slam, since Gisela Dulko and María Emilia Salerni played in 2009.
In any case, the title on Spanish clay came as a corollary of several interesting results this season, since she had reached the semifinals at the WTA 125 in Puerto Vallarta, and won an ITF 75 in Vero Beach, Florida; Last year she reached the final of the Argentina Open in Buenos Aires, but fell to the Brazilian Laura Pigossi in the decisive duel. Now, she gave herself a treat that allows her to adjust the schedule and aim for more challenging tests.
“I am very happy for this week. My team and I have worked hard to reach these levels. Being in the Top 100 makes me very happy, but there is a lot of work ahead, many things to experience. I am quite calm and I want to continue on that path,” said Carlé, who is trained by Matías Cáceres and at the time she also had the collaboration of Franco Davin from Miami.
The next step for Carlé will be joining the Argentine team that will play American Zone 1 of the Billie Jean King Cup, the competition with a format similar to the Davis Cup among women, and which in the coming days will be played in Bogotá. The brand new 84th in the world will join the others summoned by captain Mercedes Paz: Julia Riera, Martina Capurro Taborda, Julieta Estable and Luisina Giovannini.
Carlé’s was not the only promotion of the week for Argentine tennis, since, among the men, there were an entry in the Top 100: Thiago Agustín Tirante rose 17 positions, from 108th to 91st, after becoming champion in the Mexico Challenger, played in the Federal District, by beating Canadian Alexis Galarneau in the final by 6-1 and 6-3. It was the fourth title in this category of the tour for the 22-year-old player from La Plata.
With a past as number 1 on the junior circuit, he was close to entering Roland Garros directly. “I spoke to my team and we said that if I finish this year around 70th, it will be a good ranking. I will continue playing at the highest level I can, and try to improve my game day by day and then the ranking will come,” Tirante told the ATP. The player from La Plata is coached by Javier Nalbandian, and this week he plans to continue the tour of Mexico in the Challenger that is played in Morelos.
Another outstanding promotion was that of Mariano Navone. The 9 de Julio player reached 51st place, the best of his career and with an improvement of nine steps compared to last week, after reaching the semifinals at the ATP 250 in Marrakech, in Morocco, where he achieved a valuable victory over his idol, Stan Wawrinka, in the second round, and put up a fight before falling in three sets against the Italian Matteo Berrettini, with a past Top 10 finish and who took over the title in the African competition.