Carol heads to Tajikistan for Fed Cup – Saipan Tribune

Carol Lees exploits in international tennis continues as she heads to Tajikistan next week to suit up for the Pacific Oceania Team that will compete in the 2017 Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Zone Group II.

The 15-year-old junior tennis player will travel to the Central Asian country after making stops in Morocco, New Caledonia, and Fiji for a long series of ITF Juniors Circuit tournaments. She admits to feeling tired after seeing action in seven tournaments for two months, but will soldier on as she wants to capitalize on every opportunity presented to her blossoming tennis career.

Im exhausted from playing so many tournaments and Im happy to have the break to work on the things that I need to work on to get better. I love competing though so I always enjoy the tournaments, said Lee, who appeared in the finals of both the singles and doubles events of the Oceania Open Junior Championships 2017 that concluded last weekend in Lautoka.

For the Fed Cup, Im just really honored to be a part of the team. There are some great players on our team and also from the other countries so Im going to use it as a learning experience. Im very excited about the tournament in Tajikistan, Lee said.

The CNMI player will be teaming up with Papua New Guineas Abigail Tere-Apisah, Samoas Steffi Carruthers, and New Caledonias Mayka Zima. Tahitis Patrice Cotti is Pacific Oceanias non-playing captain for the tournament that will run from July 17 to 22 at the Dushanbe Central Stadium in Dushanbe.

Joining Pacific Oceania in the competition are the host Tajikistan, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Zealand, Iran, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Turkmenistan, and Kyrgyzstan. Draws in the 2017 Fed Cup Asia/Oceania Zone Group II are not yet available, but the 13 teams will be divided into four groups with three pools having four squads and one with three teams. A round-robin format will be in place for each pool and the winner of the tournament will be promoted to Group 1 to join China, Japan, India, Thailand, South Korea, the Philippines, and Kazakhstan in the elite company.

After the Fed Cup, the world No. 233 ranked Lee will return to Fiji to train and prepare for a big ITF Juniors tournament, the Oceania Closed Junior Championshipsa B2 competition that awards 120 ranking points to the singles champion and 80 to doubles winners. Lee got 25 ranking points from the same tournament last year after advancing to the Round of 16 of the singles event.

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Carol heads to Tajikistan for Fed Cup - Saipan Tribune