All Roads Lead to New York: Previewing the ATP Summer

We are less than one week away from the start of the US Open Series, and oddly enough, we are in the middle of the post-Wimbledon clay court swing, and now is a great opportunity to look at what is to come this summer. For the very top players, the summer consists of three events, Cincinnati, Canada, and the United States Open. For the rest of the ATP World Tour participants, however, the summer takes them from the red clay of Europe to the blue hard courts of North America to the Big Apple for the final major of the year. After the jump, we'll look at the US Open Series and a couple other noteworthy events.


First off, the clay court swing draw a lot of European players, and the biggest one starts on the 18th of July, the German Open. This tournament has a very extensive history, and was once the biggest warmup to the French Open. With the revamping of the schedule a few years ago, it was demoted from a Masters Series/1000 event to a 500 event, a lower spot, and it was forced to move its event to after Wimbledon. This has hurt the tournament a lot, but it still draws many top players who don't quite want to go to the hard courts of North America quite yet. After that tournament, the clay court players go to Gstaad in Switzerland and then to Austria for a brand new event with a considerable purse. That concludes that phase, and the players who would play those move over to North America after collecting those valuable ranking points.

For the American and hard court players, the summer begins tomorrow with the Atlanta tournament, followed by Los Angeles, Washington D.C, and then the two 1000 series events in Montreal and Cincinnati. One of the best moves that the USTA has done in recent years has been the advent of the US Open Series, which connects the aforementioned tournaments and creates a mini-points race with the opportunity to increase their prize money considerably at the US Open. This has created a lot of increased increase in sponsorships, prize moneys at the individual tournaments, and the ability to draw top players consistently. The top four will most likely only play the two 1000 series events, but after that, many top players will participate in the US Open Series.

With television coverage being available on the weekends, we'll have previews up when available. Summer is the sport's last huge push for the year, and we are very much looking forward to it. We are also proud to announce that, barring any unforeseen problems, we will be hosting out very first podcast to preview the tournament in Montreal. Stay tuned, it should be a great summer of tennis