Sewing And Munro Can’t Top Whitwell’s Triple Crown At The Association Of Pickleball Players Chicago Open

Shelby Bates (L) and Sofia Sewing (R) celebrate their Women’s Pro Doubles title.

APP

The Association of Pickleball Players (APP) celebrated Labor Day weekend 2025 with a return to its roots, heading home to hold the 6th annual APP Chicago Open. In 2020, this tournament was the first official event the tour ever held as Chicago-native and tour founder Ken Herrmann launched his vision for professional pickleball. Here we now sit, six years later, and the Chicago Open is one of the longest continually running events in the pro sport.

This is the 5th year the event has been held in Highland Park, and this is the 9th event of the APP’s 2025 slate of Tier 1 and Tier 2 events. This weekend’s event was broadcast on the Marquee Sports Network, home of the Chicago Cubs, marking the first time Pickleball has been shown on the network.

Click here for the UTRSports.net home page for the event, where you can get tournament details, draw sheets, and results.

News and Noteworthy ahead of the Event

It has been a very busy few weeks leading up to the Chicago Open for the APP, with several major announcements. The APP’s media spokesperson Daniel Sagerman has been running ragged for the past few weeks.

• On 8/21/25: the APP, which has been hosting its own version of the Collegiate National championships for two years, announced it has partnered with three other groups (National Intramural and Recreational Sports Association (NIRSA), Selkirk Sport and USA Pickleball) to create the Collegiate Series, aimed at growing
  collegiate pickleball in the USA.
• On 8/26/25: the APP releases its 2026 schedule. The schedule consists of 12 nationally televised APP Tour events, featuring familiar and brand-new tour stops, an expanded APP NextGen calendar, the recently announced APP Selkirk Collegiate Series, and Showcase Events such as the Women’s Open.
• On 8/25/25: Ahead of the APP Chicago Open, top APP pro Jack Munro throws out the first pitch at the White sox game.
• On 8/27/25: the APP, which in June announced partnerships with Global Sports in India and Pickleball England, added partnerships with several other
  organizations to launch the first Global Professional Pickleball tour. The APP adds partnerships with the Canadian National Pickleball League (CNPL), the
  European Pickleball Federation (EPF), India’s Global Sports, Australia’s National Pickleball League (NPL), Pickleball England, and Vietnam’s Pickleball D-Joy
  to form the alliance. The biggest benefits will be a non-conflicting/planned event schedule (also announced) as well as a global ranking system.
• The APP also announced partnerships with Shriners to promote charitable efforts in the sports.

With that said, let’s recap the action from Chicago.

Men’s Pro Singles Recap

Men’s Singles on the APP is entering a new era of competitiveness, as former champions have moved on and new blood is taking over. Seven of the Eight singles champions so far in 2025 were not in Chicago, which meant a great opportunity for the tour’s up-and-coming players to grab some hardware.

No. 1 seed Jack Foster, who has medaled in singles no fewer than 13 times on tour without getting a gold, unfortunately had to retire out of his quarter final match, paving the way for No. 5 Ronan Camron to advance into his second pro singles final over Great Lakes Open silver medalist Boyer. From the bottom half, No 3 seed and defending APP event champion Ammar Wazir survived a 16-14 game three win in the quarters over Wade Heerboth to cruise into the gold medal match.

In the final, Wazir repeated as gold medalist, beating Camron in an epic first game 20-18 and then holding on for the 18,9 win.

Gold: Ammar Wazir. Silver: Ronan Camron. Bronze: Dustin Boyer

Women’s Pro Singles Recap

Women’s Pro Singles on the APP has been dominated by two women this year: No. 1 Sofia Sewing and No. 2 Katerena “Kat” Stewart. Between the two of them, they’ve won six of the eight titles this season. The two top players have met four times previously this season, with Sewing winning three times in quarter final matchups on her way to titles. However, in Midland a few weeks ago, Stewart got over the hump, topped Sewing in the semis and paved the way for a gold medal.

The two top seeds ended up on a collision course of the chalk-heavy draw, with Sewing topping No. 5 Turkovic in one semi and Stewart topping No. 3 Hendry in the other. In the final, in their 5th meeting of the season, Sewing took back control of their rivalry with a 12,6 win to take the title. It’s Sewing’s 5th singles gold on tour this year.

Gold: Sofia Sewing. Silver: Kat Stewart. Bronze: Domenika Turkovic.

Mixed Pro Doubles Recap

It was a tough weekend for the APP’s top Mixed teams. Three of the four top seeds were eliminated in the quarters or even before, leaving the draw wide open for the No. 2 seeds Megan Fudge & Jack Munro to cruise to the title. They topped Bohnert & Kawka in the quarters, then Megan took out her husband Ryler DeHeart (and partner Rianna Valdes) in the semis before beating No. 5 Daria Walczak & William Sobek in the final.

It’s the 5th gold for Fudge & Munro in Mixed, and it should be enough to supplant the current No. 1 team (Howells & Oshiro) at the top of the rankings for the top seed in the next APP event. Sobek earns his best ever Pro Mixed medal, having several bronzes in the past but never having made the gold medal match.

Gold: Fudge & Munro. Silver: Walczak & Sobek. Bronze: Newell & Blanco.

Men’s Pro Doubles Recap

After missing a couple of events this summer due to MLP duty, the APP’s top Male Doubles team was back together and breezed to a gold medal. No. 1 Will Howells & Jack Munro took the title in Chicago without dropping a game, and without really being challenged along the way, demonstrating the gulf between themselves and the rest of the tour. With the title, Munro secures the “double double” for the weekend, winning both Pro doubles titles.

In the final, they renewed their rivalry with No. 2 Erik Lange & Max Manthou, making this the fourth time this season these two pairs have met in the final. Lange & Manthou made the final by vanquishing the two-time APP defending champs No. 3 Livornese & Tomassi in the semis, a match that was more than a little tense after an awful line-call soured the end of game two.

Gold: Munro & Howells. Silver: Lange & Manthou. Bronze: Livornese & Tomassi.

Women’s Pro Doubles Recap

A great fear amongst the APP’s pro women seems to be coming true; Sofia Sewing is now a threat to win gold in Doubles as well as Singles. Sewing, who quickly ascended to the No. 1 spot in Singles inside of half a season, teamed with Shelby Bates to cruise through the draw as the No. 7 Seeds and secure the Women’s Pro Doubles title without dropping a game.

Along the way, they beat the No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 seeded teams and made a big statement to the rest of the tour. The win gave Sewing a double gold for the weekend (Singles and Doubles), but more importantly gave veteran Shelby Bates her first career APP gold.

Gold: Sewing & Bates. Silver: Fudge & Braverman. Bronze: Maddox & Hendry.

AARP Champions Pro Competition Quick Recap

• Men’s Champions Pro Singles: A badly under-seeded Marco Osorio upset top seed and tour No. 1 Jardim in the 16s and made a run to the final, where he lost to No. 3 Youssef Bouzidi. Bouzidi wins his 4th singles title since April on tour and continues his push for the top spot by the end of his first year on tour.
• Women’s Champions Pro Singles: Lee Whitwell took the latest salvo in her competition with Karin Ptaszek-Kochis for the top spot on tour, winning in two games for her second APP title in a row.
• Men’s Champions Pro Doubles: Jamie Oncins & Marcello Jardim continued their dominance of Champions Pro doubles on the APP, winning from the No. 1 seed slot.
• Women’s Champions Pro Doubles: Lee Whitwell teamed back up with long-time partner Angela Simon to claim their 10th career Champions Pro doubles gold medal together as the No. 1 seed.
• Mixed Champions Pro Doubles: Lee Whitwell sewed up the Champions Triple Crown in Chicago by winning the Mixed event with Jardim (who claimed a double gold himself for the weekend). It’s Whitwell’s second straight triple crown on tour.

AARP Masters Pro Competition Quick Recap

• Men’s Masters Pro Singles: Howard Mendel took his second APP Masters Pro Singles title in a row, beating top seed Treister in the final.
• Women’s Masters Pro Singles: Lupita Curiel outpointed Lynn Salo to take the round robin Women’s Masters singles title, just the 5th ever competed on tour.
• Men’s Masters Pro Doubles: The Midland gold medalists split up for Chicago and met in the final, with Dan Granot (teamed with Scott Moore) getting the better of his Michigan Partner Howard Mendel (teamed with Miguel Nido).
• Women’s Masters Pro Doubles: Yannet Brister & Kelly Ojeda upended the top seeds early to win a stacked field.
• Mixed Masters Pro Doubles: Heather Iffert & John Moorin took the title as the No. 1 seeds.

The Pro Pickleball Medal Tracker has now been updated with these results; check out this link online for a complete pro medal history for all tours and all pro events dating to the beginnings of all the major pro tours, plus pro events that predated 2020.

Next up on the Pickleball Calendar? According to my Master Pickleball Schedule, the APP has two Breakthrough Series events scheduled for September (in Boise and Brigham City), then returns to action the first weekend in November for the 2025 Women’s Cup in Columbus.

Any Head to Head or career match stats quoted in this article are courtesy of PickleWave. Visit picklewave.com for the premier source of Pro Pickleball data, including match replays, highlights, stats, and discussion. PickleWave has more than 22,000 matches in its database across all the pro tours.

Other resources I use frequently to cover Pickleball include: