Por CBTM
Travelling Man
He has played in no less than five ITTF World Junior Circuit events this year and if my mathematics and geography are both correct, he is the only player to have competed on four continents!
There can be few other table tennis players, who in search of improving their standard of play, have earned more air miles in 2005 than Efraim CARVALHO.
In February, he travelled to Europe to compete in the World Junior Circuit event in Örebro, Sweden; the following month he was in North Africa at the Morocco Junior Open and then in April he was in Asia at the United Arab Emirates Junior Open; in May it was back to Europe for the Spanish Youth Open and then in late June it was a flight to Oceania for the Fiji Open.
Hectic
A hectic schedule and just to make sure he wasn't becoming a little bored, he played in Latin America on the ITTF Pro Tour at the Liebherr Brazilian Open.
The tournament ended the day the ITTF World Junior Circuit event in Fiji started and had it not been for the fact that the Latin American Under 18 Championships clashed with the ITTF World Junior Circuit event in Canada then no doubt he'd have been in Vancouver and therefore would have played in every continent in a period of six months!
El Salvador
In El Salvador, he was the number two seed in the Junior Boys' Singles and won the title by recovering from an opening game deficit to beat Bruno LEVIS of Chile in the final, having at the semi-final stage experienced his toughest test en route to gold when overcoming the latter's colleague, Andres CORTES in seven games at the penultimate stage.
Furthermore, he was a member of the successful Brazilian team who won the Under 18 Boys' Team event and with Marianny NONAKA clinched the Under 18 Mixed Doubles title.
FROM ITTF (www.ittf.com)
