MANILA, Philippines — Filipino tennis ace Alex Eala bagged a total of €47,195 prize money or P3.3 million as she ended her WTA 1000 Madrid Open campaign on Saturday.
Eala pocketed €31,585 or P2.2 million for reaching the singles round of 64 (second round) and an additional €15,610 or P1.1 million for making the doubles round of 16 (second round) for the said total.
Eala started her campaign with a 6-3, 6-3 win over Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova in the singles first round last Wednesday.
World no. 44 Eala yielded to No 21 Elise Mertens in the second round, 2-6, 1-6, on Friday.
With Turkish partner Zeynep Sonmez, Eala kickstarted her doubles campaign with a 6-2, 6-2 victory against the Taiwanese-Hungarian duo of Chan Hao-ching and Fanny Stollar last Thursday.
The close pals Eala and Sonmez then succumbed to the elite Czech-American duo of Katerina Siniakova and Taylor Townsend in the round of 16 (second round), 1-6, 5-7, on Saturday.
Eala achieved a doubles career-high ranking after reaching the Madrid second round, surging from 101 to 87 with 888 points at the live rankings.
Eala was boosted with 120 net points after her first round win.
Her new career-high, which is 12 notches higher than her previous best of 99, will reflect on Monday when the official rankings make its weekly update.
Eala will now take her act to the 125 Catalonia Open in La Bisbal d'Empordà also in Spain.
The tournament will run April 27 to May 3, a perfect buildup for Eala for the 1000 Rome Open running from May 5 to 17.
Despite being a 125-tier tourney, Catalonia drew a competitive field of players with world No. 25 Leylah Fernandez being the top seed.
The draw also includes No. 31 Wang Xinyu, No. 34 Ann Li, No. 42 Kateřina Siniaková, No. 43 Peyton Stearns, No. 47 Laura Sigemund, and No. 48 McCartney Kessler.
Dalma Galfi is ranked No. 117, although she ruled the tournament last year and is trying to defend her crown this time in a deep field.
