Hometown hero Peyton Stearns wins first ever all-Women's Red Bull BassLine exhibition in Cincinnati

Being held at the Cincinnati Open venue, the usual fayre of the Red Bull BassLine exhibition headed to Mason, Ohio and it was won by Peyton Stearns the hometown hero who is from Ohio.

The exhibition event brought together Peyton Stearns as well as Emma Navarro, McCartney Kessler, Sofia Kenin, Donna Vekic and Eva Lys with most including Lys posting on social media about the event which sees a DJ as well as the action on court so creates humorous social media content.

It was the first ever all-women's Red Bull BassLine and sees players compete in two groups with no umpire. It is a tie-break format to the beat of a live DJ on court with the winners of each group advancing to the final. In the championship match, Stearns overcame Sofia Kenin sealing a 5-3, 5-3 win to lift the trophy. This was the ninth edition with Carlos Alcaraz, Andrey Rublev and Alexander Zverev claiming the title among others before.

“It’s pretty amazing, especially being in Cincinnati,” Stearns said after the final. “I’m from here, so it means something special to me. And it’s amazing to have so many good female players out here supporting this and hopefully it keeps on going.”

“I love the music, I love that people can talk during the point. I played college tennis, so I’m super used to people cheering, yelling during points. I thought it was super cool.”

“I didn’t really know what to expect, honestly,” added runner-up Sofia Kenin. “It was fun competing, playing, and the atmosphere was amazing. Having the DJ play every point was super fun, very relaxed. Compared to how we play and compete, week after week, this was a really nice change-up for us.”

It was initially pencilled in also as an event led by Emma Navarro with the American's father Ben running the tournament as part of his venture Beemok Capital. He also runs the Charleston Open and often leads at this juncture to much conversation about the fact that Navarro is a 'billionaire heiress' and 'the second richest tennis player' behind Jessica Pegula. She herself was very pleased with the event as a Cincinnati Open warm-up. “I think it’s a great warm-up. Even though it’s different than how the tournament will be, I think it’s good to get out on the courts that we’re going to play on, play against some of our competitors, and have a crowd in the stands. It was a good warm-up," said Navarro.