Ben Bartram named ITF Junior Wheelchair Tennis Player of the Year 2022
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Britain’s Ben Bartram has today been named as the winner of the International Tennis Federation’s Junior Wheelchair Tennis Player of the Year Award for 2022.
Launched in 2020, the award recognises young wheelchair tennis players who both impress with their results on court and embody the principles of leadership and sportsmanship off it. The ITF Wheelchair Committee selected the winners from a shortlist of nominees, Bartram becoming the second British player on our Wheelchair Performance Pathway to win the boys’ award after Dahnon Ward was named the inaugural winner in 2020.
17-year-old Bartram, from Sprowston in Norfolk, who is supported by our Pro Scholarship Programme, said: “It’s a massive honour to receive this award and it’s great to see all the hard work getting recognised in this way.
"It’s been a very good year for me, but I’d like to see this as only the start of my career and I’m looking forward to the future and what’s to come. It shows how well British wheelchair tennis is doing in the junior and the senior game and the support we have from the LTA is a huge part of that.”
After reaching a career-best No.1 ranking in the Junior Wheelchair Tennis Rankings in January 2021, Bartram has maintained his No.2 ranking throughout 2022, while starting this season by winning the boys’ singles and doubles titles at the Cruyff Foundation Junior Masters in Tarbes, the premier international tournament for junior wheelchair tennis players.
It’s been a very good year for me, but I’d like to see this as only the start of my career and I’m looking forward to the future and what’s to come.
In September he also won the boys’ singles and doubles titles as the US Open became the first Grand Slam to host a junior wheelchair tennis tournament. At both the Junior Masters and the US Open Bartram contested the singles finals against Ward and they paired up to secure victory in the boys’ doubles.
A student at Easton College in Norwich, Bartram has, to date, improved his senior men’s singles world ranking by 45 places in 2022, reaching a career best at No.16 in August after an unbeaten sequence of six senior singles titles in a row, including five at ITF Futures and one at ITF 3 level.
Earlier this year, when still aged 16, he also made his senior international team debut, helping Great Britain to win the men’s event at the World Team Cup Qualification in Turkey before again representing the men’s team in the World Group event in Vilamoura in May, becoming LTA Colour Holder No.315. Later in May Bartram was named Junior of the Year in the LTA Tennis Awards 2022.
Erik Koers, Head of the LTA’s Wheelchair Performance Pathway said: “What a great achievement for Ben to be awarded the 2022 ITF Junior Player of the Year award.
"Ben has made huge progress this year, both as a player and as a person, especially winning so many Futures tournaments and the first ever US Open junior boys’ singles and doubles titles. We are excited to keep supporting Ben and our other British junior players on their wheelchair tennis journey and we hope to see them qualify and perform well at future major events, including the Paris 2024 Paralympics.”
