Two members of the Chattahoochee Area Tennis Association (CHATA) are heading to the United States Tennis Association NTRP Nationals tournament in Surprise, Arizona, on April 10-12. LaGrange locals Jorge Encinas and Manuel Bustamante have been making a name for themselves on the local tennis circuit for the last several years and are two of the top amateur tennis players in the Southeast.
“It’s coming up soon, and I’m starting to get really excited for it,” Encinas said. “I’ve been working towards this for about a year now.”
Encinas, a national from Mexico, debuted in USTA tennis tournaments in 2024, and it has been a meteoric rise ever since. He is currently the highest-ranked player out of LaGrange, as he sat at no. 4 in year-end national rankings.
This will be an entirely new experience for Encinas, who will be making his first trip to nationals.
“I’m a little nervous. I won’t lie to you,” Encinas said. “We’ve been working all year, you know, and just to come to this point. So it feels good. I haven’t been there, so right now I’m feeling excited and nervous.”
Bustamante, on the other hand, is a veteran now. This will be the 42-year-old’s third straight trip to the nationals tournament.
“It’s a tournament, just like any other. So I really want to just take it like that, but I think at the same time, you enjoy the pressure. You have to enjoy how special this tournament is because it is not like any other tournament,” Bustamante said. “The competition level is so high this year. It’s going to be a challenge, but it’s going to be fun.”
This will be the final hurrah as a singles player for Bustamante. The plan is for Bustamante to start playing doubles locally with the hopes of qualifying for the doubles national tournament as soon as 2027 or 2028.
Bustamante has accumulated a total of 20 singles titles, three men’s doubles titles, and 1 mixed doubles title. He is formerly ranked no. 1 in the national ranking (44 straight weeks) and is looking for his first national title.