I'm spectating

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

Photos of Day 2, 2014

Halep

Safarova v Schiavone

Vinci/Errani watching on

Back row of KRA

Bouchard

Mattek-Sands

Kerber

Cibulkova

Halep

Babos and Safarova

Halep and Olaru

ALG and Errani

Lucic-Baroni and Grönefeld

Cornet and McHale

Monday, January 6, 2014

Today was a nice day. It was Kids Day at the tennis so those 16 and under got in free. There were many activities for the children and it looked very popular. The courts weren't completely packed with children so that was a good thing too ;)

It became quite hot in the sun but overall it was fine. Good match ups on the outside such that I only spent about 15 minutes inside KRA. This year Sydney Tennis changed their tickets - instead of $14.95 (previously $9.90) grounds passes from Sunday - Wednesday they have $20 'silver tickets' which allows access into the back of KRA. I bought my ticket online last night and it was at the very back row but smack bang in the middle of the court. I don't know why anyone would pay for a 'gold ticket' since the arena is never full and you can pretty much sit anywhere once you're inside.

My day started at Lucie v Fran's match, meanwhile an exhibition occurred inside the arena but it didn't sound too enthralling. The singing from Jai the x-factor kid (who Vika said was cute) sounded awful. Once Genie/BMS' match began I went inside KRA and watched 5 games of that. From my seat in the back row I can see Grandstand and the practice courts. I then went to watch Angie/Domi and stayed there for the entire 7-6, 7-5 match. It was a high quality match with some awesome rallies. Domi double faulted a few times at critical points, including to lose the first set. Afterwards I went to the smaller outside courts, watching some matches from the gate I saw Sventlana lose to Vavara, a few points of Vesely's match (Wimbledon's website wrote that he is one to watch in 2014. Anyways he lost to a German.), some of the Halep/Olaru v Safarova/Babos match, then nearly all of Vinci/Errani v Grönfeld/Lucic-Baroni.

By far the longest place I stayed at for the entire day was 3 minutes short of 3 hours at Cornet v McHale. Long rallies in every game. Alizé got so emotional over some bad line calls and Christina just returned everything that came her way. Cornet was up a break in the third and served for it up 5-4 but a contentious call in the first point lead to the loss of the last 3 games. Solid performance from McHale for making it through qualies and being able to back it up today. She also looked very tired but not a squeak came out of her. It wasn't until she was down 4-5 that she took off her long sleeve top! In the end she took it out 6-7, 6-2, 7-5.

I also have a silver ticket for tomorrow and that's probably it for my Sydney tennis experience this year.

Sunday, January 5, 2014

Qualifications wrap up

Although qualies are not over (there is still one round for the women and two for the men), yesterday was the last 'free' tennis day. Today Day 1 of the tournament begins with 3 main draw singles matches and a doubles match inside KRA. I'm not going so I can rest up (a big 2 weeks ahead - this time next week I will be in Melbourne!) and plus it's mostly qualifying anyways. I've been too tired to blog/upload photos after I get home so now is my chance to catch up :)

On the first day of qualies I became unbelievably sunburnt. I've never experienced anything like it. Ironically during the day I was checking my arms to make sure I wasn't getting burnt and I didn't realise my back was lobster red until I looked at the mirror. Hopefully it fades soon without the whole peeling thing but on the second day I was extra careful to seek cover. Hello cold showers and aloe vera!

There has been some positive changes to the layout of the site. After all these years they finally have the common sense to put the seating not facing the sun on Grandstand. One of the practice courts is now the kids interactive zone and the empty Court 4 has become a match court. The volunteers/ball kids/linespeople tents have also moved. The media centre is massive and looks exponentially better than it did, at least from the outside (their air conditioning is very noticable). The most annoying thing is that Court 7 still has no seating. They could squeeze in 2 rows of seating similar to the Australian Open. Or at least put some chairs out.

The matches have been good but it's just not quite the same without my favourite player here so I haven't been too invested in the result. Unfortunately the Pliskovas and Garcia withdrew but I still got to see some players I liked (Babos, Piter, Minella, Tsurenko) and there were some that I saw for the first time. The Americans (BMS, Lepchenko, McHale, Duval, Davis) have all been winning, while all the Australians lost in the first round. I wanted to see some men's match so the first one I saw was a Swiss, Henri Laaksonen. I also managed to watch about 5 games of Harrison's but the rest of the time I found myself sitting at women's matches.

Yesterday afternoon I was watching Feuerstein playing soccer tennis on the court, ALG doing drills, Timea playing a practice match while listening to these two coaches talking about the work ethic and mentality of some pros on the tour. They had a saying: two arms, two legs, a head and an arse hole. It is interesting all the insight they have and the life - travelling around the world going from tournament to tournament.