U.S. Open 2009 Tickets

The U.S. Open originates from two separate tournaments: the men's tournament and the women's tournament. The event was first held in August 1881 and staged at the Newport Casino, Newport, Rhode Island (men's singles only). The championships were known as the U.S. National Singles US Open 2009 tickets Championship for men. Only clubs that were members of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association were permitted to enter.

In 1900, U.S. National Men's Doubles Championship was held for the first time. Tournaments were held in the east and the west of the country in order to determine the best two teams (sectional winners). These would then compete in a play-off - the winner would play the defending champions in the challenge round.

Six years after the men's nationals were held, the first official U.S. Women's National Singles Championship was held at the Philadelphia Cricket Club in 1887, US Open 2009 tickets followed by the U.S. Women's National Doubles Championship in 1889. The first U.S. Mixed Doubles Championship was held alongside the Women's Singles and Doubles.

The Open Era began in 1968 when all five events were merged into the newly named U.S. Open at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, Queens. Notably, the 1968 combined tournament was opened to professionals; neither predecessor tournament allowed professionals to compete. That year, 96 men and 63 women entered the event with prize money amounting to $100,000. The U.S. Open was originally played US Open 2009 tickets on grass until Forest Hills switched to hard courts in the mid '70s. In 1978, the event moved from Forest Hills to its current home at Flushing Meadows.

The main court is located at the 23,000-seat Arthur Ashe Stadium, named after Arthur Ashe, the great African American tennis player who won the inaugural men's final of the U.S. Open in 1968. (British tennis great Virginia Wade won the first woman's U.S. Open final, five months after she turned professional.) Ashe died in 1993 of AIDS, which he contracted from a blood transfusion during heart surgery. Court Number 2 is Louis Armstrong Stadium, which stood as the main US Open 2009 tickets stadium until the completion of Ashe stadium. The surfaces of all its courts are hard, so the U.S. Open always provides tennis at a very high speed.

The U.S. Open is also unique in that it is the only Grand Slam event where most of the courts are lit, meaning that TV coverage of the tournament can extend into US Open 2009 tickets prime-time to attract more ratings. This has recently been used to the advantage of the USA Network on cable and especially for CBS, the American broadcast TV outlet for the Open for many years, which used its influence to move the women's singles final to Saturday night to draw better television ratings.

In 2005, all U.S. Open and U.S. Open Series Tennis courts were given blue inner courts and green outer courts to show uniformity, and to make it easier to see the ball. This change has been met with mixed reactions from both players and fans, many players saying that the ball is no easier to see with the blue courts.

Celebrating its 125th year, the US Open has not always been the two-week extravaganza it is today. US Open 2009 tickets The change from an amateur event known as the U.S. National Championships to the US Open - the richest professional tennis event in the world open to amateurs and professionals - is the most obvious metamorphosis. But there are many other US Open 2009 tickets more subtle changes.

The five major championships that constitute the US Open - men's and women's singles, men's and women's doubles and mixed doubles - grew from a single men's tournament held as an entertainment diversion for high society at the turn of the 20th century.

The first U.S. National Singles Championship for men was held at the Newport Casino, Newport, R.I., in August 1881. Only clubs that were members of the United States National Lawn Tennis Association were permitted to enter. That was the beginning of a 34-year reign for Newport US Open 2009 tickets as the tennis center of the country.

Men's doubles was played in conjunction with men's singles at the Newport Casino for the first seven years, 1881-86, before it began moving to various sites. In fact, the five major events of the U.S. National Championships/US Open have been played at nine different sites throughout their histories, including the USTA National Tennis Center. Men's doubles has been played at eight of those sites.

Beginning in 1900, the U.S. National Men's Doubles Championship was layered, with tournaments held in the East and West and sectional winners playing off to determine which team would meet the defending champions in the challenge round. By 1907, there were three preliminary sectional tournaments. The 1918 U.S. National Men's Doubles Championship was a playing-through tournament, the sectional doubles and resulting challenge round having been US Open 2009 tickets abandoned. In 1919, the format of qualifying sectional winners and a challenge round was used for the final time. Thereafter, the format for men's US Open 2009 tickets doubles hardly changed, except for the switch to best-of-three sets from best-of-five in 1993.

In 1887, six years after the men's nationals were instituted as an annual event, the first US Open 2009 tickets official U.S. Women's National Singles Championship was held at the US Open 2009 tickets Philadelphia Cricket Club, joined by women's doubles in 1889. Of the five major events that constitute the US Open, women's singles has been the least traveled. U.S. women's singles has been contested in just three places: Philadelphia Cricket Club, West Side Tennis Club and the USTA National Tennis Center.

The U.S. Mixed Doubles Championship officially began in 1892 and was played in conjunction with the women's singles and doubles until 1921. Starting in 1921, mixed doubles was combined with the men's doubles program US Open 2009 tickets of the U.S. National Championships.

The advent of the Open Era in 1968 consolidated all five major U.S. tennis championships into the US Open at the West Side Tennis Club in Forest Hills, US Open 2009 tickets Queens, N.Y. A total of $100,000 was offered to the field of 96 men and 63 US Open 2009 tickets women who entered men's and women's singles and doubles that year. Today, the US Open offers more than $18.5 Million to a field of more than 600 men and women, including qualifying.

source :.frontrowking.com