Tennis News and Information, Tournament Coverage and Features
September 14, 2010 – NikeTown – New York City – Niketown hosts a Q & A session for 2010 US Open Rafael Nadal with John McEnroe. Nadal fielded questions from McEnroe who also took fans questions for Nadal.
Fan Guide: Cincinnati Western & Southern Financial Group tournaments
by Megan Fernandez
Dates: Aug. 13-21, 2011
Why go? Because Cincinnati is a cut-rate Grand Slam doppelganger–an elite field combined with the top men’s and women’s players in the world, in a venue that’s a lot less chaotic and overwhelming than the majors.
Tickets run $30 to $75 for main-draw sessions. A ticket includes a reserved seat in Center Court and general admission to all other courts. (Usually, there are matches on the other courts through the Friday day session.) Single-session tickets are sold only for the Center Court’s upper-level section (Terrace). For lower-level seats (Box and Loge), the best deals are on Craig’s List.
Center Court’s Terrace seats are decent. You can see the court well from the top row, but you may not be able to see players’ facial reactions. For a view from the top row of Terrace, click here: https://assets.usta.com/assets/663/15/TERRACE_3.pdf
Some notes on specific sections:
Avoid the traffic jam on I-71 coming from the south (the exit is shared by the tennis center and Kings Island amusement park) by taking an alternate route: I-75 to Tylersville Road (exit 22) to Fairway Drive. There will be signs to follow to Lot B and Lot C.
For the best parking, buy a Lot A pass online from a season-ticket holder. Lot A has a dedicated entrance.
Cincy is often 90+ degrees, and it feels hotter in the stands. Wear plenty of sunscreen and drink lots of water (you can bring in one closed bottle).
To cool off, check out the on-site museum. You’ll be surprised at how much history the tournament has: At more than 110 years in Cincy, it’s the oldest tournament in the U.S. held in the original location.
Score some shade in a covered box seat on the Grandstand court when there aren’t matches in session. Skip the table in the sun at the food court and eat there instead. This is also a great place to wait out a rain delay—everyone else will be packed inside the retail tent!
Kids can take watch an exhibition with pros, get player autographs, and more on Kids Day (Aug. 13, 2011). Tickets are half-price and include a seat for the matches.
When you arrive, first check the practice schedule posted on an electronic board near the player entrance, west of Center Court, and at the information desk. For the top players, stands fill up at least 30 minutes in advance of the practice time. On the day of the final, the players usually warm up separately on Center Court, starting a few hours before match time.
The best place for an autograph is in the breezeway connecting the main building to the player’s entrance.
Players often sign autographs and take photos after a practice session, at the fence by their chair.
Keep your eyes open for players walking near the south and west sides of Center Court. Does that tall guy in tennis gear walking alone look familiar? Could be Victor Hanescu or Mark Knowle. It’s okay to stop someone in a courteous manner. Often, players who aren’t in the spotlight like to be recognized and talk to fans.
To be on TV, get to the ESPN broadcast booth right after a semifinal or final. It’s set up outside of Center Court, on the southeast side. The commentators broadcast from there before and after each televised match, and fans are allowed to stand behind them. After a match, the winner is usually interviewed at the desk immediately. When the desk is not being used, fans are usually permitted to sit there for a photo op.
During matches on Center Court, coaches and entourages often sit in Box 130, in the northwest corner. They have also been spotted in Box 111, on the east side.
Spring for a room at the Marriott Northeast in Mason, the official tournament hotel. Stay there (or just go to dinner there), and you’re likely to see players and tennis insiders. For a good pool and restaurant, try this writer’s favorite hotel: Doubletree Guest Suites in Blue Ash, 7 miles from the site.
Gates open two hours before the day’s first match. Matches start earlier on qualifying days, which means the grounds opens earlier. If you arrive early, you might have a semi-private viewing session of a top player’s practice.
Eat the local cuisine in the food court: Graeter’s ice cream, Skyline Chili, and LaRosa Pizza from the food court.
Favorite souvenir: Stick-It-Wear?! t-shirts, featuring a stick-figure profile of top players past and present. They aren’t ID’d, but tennis fans would know Nadal’s high-knee fist pump anywhere. Look for them in the retail tent.
If you’re a roller-coaster junkie, make time to visit Kings Island amusement park, just across the interstate from the tennis center. (And keep an eye out for players.) It’s home to the longest, tallest and fastest wooden coasters in the world.
On Friday and Saturday nights, look east around 10 p.m. to see Kings Island’s fireworks show.
Megan Fernandez will be covering the Cincinnati tournament for Tennis Panorama News. In addition to her online articles, she’ll be taking over our twitter account @GVTennisNews providing updates, commentary and photos during both tournaments.
Updated 8/10/2011
For the first time in its storied history, Wimbledon has hired an official poet to capture “the flavour and fervour of the world’s leading tennis tournament.â€
A lifelong tennis fan, Matt Harvey is known by British audiences for his Radio 4 Saturday Live broadcasts. As “The Championships Poet†for 2010 he’ll be writing a poem-a-day on all things Wimbledon. Along with the daily poems he’ll have a daily audio podcast, a blog and will interact with fans via twitter (@WimbledonPoet ).
WimbledonPoet I caught up with the very busy Mr. Harvey to ask a few questions in regard to his new appointment:
Karen Pestaina: How did you get your start in writing poetry?
Matt Harvey: I’ve written poetry since I was a teenager, secretly to begin with. I began to perform in public in my twenties, self-publishing chapbooks which I sold at gigs. I went full-time as a ‘writer-performer’ in my late thirties. In my early forties I had my first ‘proper’ book (The Hole in the Sum of my Parts) published. Definitely a late developer.
KP: Which poets influenced you growing up and who are your favorites now?
MH: Growing up I loved Edward Lear, Lewis Carroll, Mervyn Peake – a little older the ‘Liverpool Poets’, Roger McGough, Brian Patten, Adrian Henri. Then it was into anthologies and reading e e cummings, Edna St Vincent Millay, Betjeman, Stevie Smith, Auden and Borges.
These days I love John Hegley, all the above, Roethke, only recently discovered Shel Silverstein, can you believe it?
KP: What was the process that led you to becoming the poet of “the Championships.”
MH: The All England Lawn Tennis Club had previously had Championship Artists –all painters of one kind or another – but this year they decided to try something different and invite a poet. To this end they consulted The Poetry Trust, active in the promotion of poetry in the UK, who recommended me. A seed was sown, then a few days later someone at Wimbledon heard me on BBC radio. A month or so after that I was invited to Wimbledon to talk about the form a poetry residency might take. And here I am.
KP: How difficult do you think it will be to write a poem a day? How will you approach it? Will you walk the grounds, stay in the media areas?
MH: How difficult? Somewhere between ‘quite’ and ‘very’, though some days I’m sure it’ll be ‘extremely’. People have asked if I ever suffer ‘writer’s block’ and the answer is no, but I frequently experience ‘good writer’s block’.
I’ll definitely walk the grounds rather than stay in the media areas. By the way, I should say, before anyone gets too jealous (mild jealousy is, however, appropriate) that I don’t have access to the show courts – Centre Court and Courts 1 and 2 – but otherwise can roam freely. A free range poet. I shall be writing about the place and the people as much if not more than the tennis. Poems about ball boys and girls, umpires, grass, strawberries, oohs and aahs, the queues, the roof, what proximity to people at the peak of physical fitness and beauty does to middle aged English people, well, men.
KP: Do you think other major championships (Australian Open, Roland Garros and the US Open) should employ a poet?
MH: I wouldn’t presume to know what such august institutions should do – but I’m all for the employment of poets in public places. From a poet’s perspective it’s an excellent idea.
KP: How do you think tennis fans will react to your poems?
MH: I have no idea. Well, I expect many to be indifferent, some maybe intrigued, irritated, amused, bored. Perhaps some, frustrated by my rank inability to evoke the essence of their beautiful game, may be inspired to write their own poetry. I’ve been taken aback by the interest generated by my appointment – when visual artists were invited there was a lot less fuss. Still, I’m not complaining – it’s nice to be sought after by the world media once in a while.
KP: Do you have any advice for future tennis poets?
Having barely begun my first ever tennis residency I’d hesitate to offer advice. In fact if there are any tennis poets out there with advice to offer me it’d be gratefully received. But I’m not sure there is such a thing as a ‘tennis poet’. There are just poets, and sometimes one of us gets lucky and is paid to write about tennis and associated phenomena. I’m thrilled just to be going there, getting to watch the world’s best players in such a splendid setting.
About Matt Harvey
Matt Harvey is a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4’s Saturday Live program and for two years wrote the Desktop Poetry slot in the Guardian. He is the creator of Empath Man on Radio 4, the contemporary superhero who fights crime through his advanced listening skills.
His latest book of poems The Hole in the Sum of my Parts – published by and available from The Poetry Trust – is in its 4th imprint. His next book Where Earwigs Dare will be published by Green Books in October 2010. He will present a new series, The Wondermentalist Cabaret, on BBC Radio 4 in early 2011.
Matt Harvey’s web site is www.mattharvey.co.uk.
Follow him on twitter at www.twitter.com/WimbledonPoet
Follow the Championships at www.Wimbledon.org
Read more about The Poetry Trust – www.thepoetrytrust.org
Grandest of Slams
By Matt Harvey
Excuse me. I’m sorry. I speak as an Englishman
For the game of lawn tennis there’s no better symbol than
Wimbledon
The place where the game’s flame was sparked and then kindled in
Where so many spines have sat straight and then tingled in
Wimbledon
Where strawberries and cream have traditionally been sampled in
Kids’ eyes have lit up and their cheeks have been dimpled in
Wimbledon
Where tough tennis cookies have cracked and then crumbled in
Top seeds have stumbled, have tumbled, been humbled in
Wimbledon
Where home-grown heroes’ hopes have swelled up and then dwindled in
Wimbledon
The Grand Slams’ best of breed, it’s the whizz it’s the biz
The temple where physics expresses its fizz
There’s one word for tennis and that one word is
Wimbledon
© Matt Harvey, The Championships Poet 2010
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