Oratory Real Tennis Club announces Moore Family Office Summer Challenge in 2025
A £20,000 pot handicap tournament is set to take place over three weeks for prime time viewing
A new tournament is set to provide primetime entertainment for real tennis fans this summer, with the Moore Family Office Summer Challenge offering the second largest prize pot in the country.
Nestled between the US Professional Singles in Newport in June and the Champions Trophy at the Royal Tennis Court in July, the Moore Family Office Summer Challenge will give UK based professionals a chance to develop their game in a high-stakes, competitive environment in time for the 2025–26 season. The total prize pot is scheduled to be £20,000, the largest for any UK tournament outside the British Open — beating the Champions Trophy at £18,000 — though the Summer Challenge will not carry World Ranking points.
The Summer Challenge will be hosted over six weekday evenings at The Oratory School in June and July stretching over three weeks. The round of 16 matches will be held on Thursday, 19 June, and Friday, 20 June, with the winners moving on to the quarter finals on Thursday, 26 June, and Friday, 27 June. The semi-finals will be held on Thursday, 3 July, and the final on Friday, 4 July.
The tournament will feature the top UK based professionals only, playing best-of-three set matches off half-handicaps, with a final played as a best-of-5 set match. The choice of half handicaps follows successful trials at the Seacourt Silver Racquet and Real 10 tournaments, giving the weaker players in the draw a chance at winning matches without making it too onerous on the stronger players, with no match to be played off more than Owe 15-Rec 15. It follows analysis showing stronger players are systematically disadvantaged in handicap competitions at the elite level, even if it is correctly calibrated at the club level. The draw will be limited to players within 20 handicap points of the best handicapped British professional.
“This is the biggest handicap professional event ever held in the UK, and we are absolutely delighted here at the Oratory to be hosting,” said Robert Fahey, head professional at The Oratory School. “We are hugely grateful to Moore Family Office for supporting this wonderful idea for the next three years. The idea is to add another significant tennis event for the leading professionals in this country who are starved of opportunities for competitive tennis.”
Tickets are being sold for the event via The Oratory School for £25 per head for the entire event, with an open bar on match nights and a welcome cocktails reception on the final evening. Those unable to attend in person will be able to follow along via the live streaming on the T&RA Media YouTube channel.
The event continues to build on the Oratory’s reputation as one of the premier tournament clubs in the UK, following their hosting of the Ladies World Championships in 2023 and the World Championship Eliminator in 2020. It will be the first event open to all British professionals outside the National League at the court since the IRTPA Championships was last held at the Oratory in 2005.
For full information and ticket purchase, please contact the Oratory professionals at pros@ortc.uk.
