Jonathan Ailstock
The Stroker’s Tour began last September, finished up in April with the awarding of a ‘points’ champion for the season (Larry Hughes) and culminated this past weekend (May 6-7) in something of a celebratory, $2,500-added, invitational Bar Box 10-Ball Championship at Wolf’s Den in Roanoke, VA; all entrants, capped at 64, had to have played in a previous event on the tour. Jonathan Ailstock went undefeated amidst a full field to claim the Stroker’s Tour Championship title. Though the earlier-designated ‘points’ champion (Hughes) did compete and eventually mounted a five-match, loss-side winning streak, he and Ailstock did not match up in the event.
Ailstock’s trip to the finals went through Jordan Shifflett, Tyler Borden, Lexi Barr and Mike Haywood to arrive at a winners’ side semifinal matchup against Barry Mashburn. Eventual runner-up Jason Potts, who’d face Ailstock in the hot seat match and finals, didn’t give up more than five racks to get to the same place against Brittany Hiltonsmith (0), Mark Peters (1), Eric Griffith (3) and Scott Roberts (1)a before arriving at his winners’ side semifinal against Justin Cason.
Potts sent Cason loss-side packing 7-4, as Ailstock and Mashburn were busy locking up in a double hill battle that eventually put Ailstock into the hot seat match. In his second straight, double-hill match, Ailstock claimed the hot seat.
On the loss side, Mashburn picked up Collin Hall, five matches into a loss-side streak that had just eliminated Scott Roberts, double hill and Jose Irizarry 7-3. Cason drew Ron Frank, who’d lost a double-hill, winners’ side quarterfinal match to Mashburn and then defeated Dylan Pannell 8-1 and Mike Haygood 8-5.
Frank put a bit of a punctuation mark on his advancement to the quarterfinals, shutting out Cason, while at the opposite end of the scoring spectrum, Hall and Mashburn battled to double hill. Hall won it to join Frank.
Hall chalked up his 6th loss-side win 7-5 versus Frank in those quarterfinals, only to be stopped from winning his 7th by Potts. Potts defeated him 7-4 for a second shot at Ailstock, waiting for him in the hot seat.
It was true double-elimination, so Potts needed to win twice. As it turned out, it was only racks-in-the-opening-set that he did twice. Ailstock completed his undefeated run 7-2 to claim the first Stroker’s Tour Championship.
Tour director Tim Bryant thanked the ownership and staff at Wolf’s Den for their hospitality. The tour is working on an upcoming schedule. Players can look for updates on the Stroker’s Pool Tour’s Facebook page.
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