Pro Stringer Issue 3 - 2017 rt 3 2017 | Page 15

Industry News Vladimir Dmitriev elected as President The city of Manchester in England has ex- pressed an interest in hosting the WTA Finals of Tennis Europe Vladimir Dmitriev has been elected as the first ever Russian President of the European Tennis Federation at the 43rd Annual General Meeting of the organisation. from 2019, when the season-ending champion- ships moves from its current home of Singa- pore. Belinda Bencic will be out of action for sev- eral months following wrist surgery earlier this week. Tommy Haas became the oldest man to win The Meeting was held in Sochi from 23-25 March, and was attended by 89 delegates representing 39 member nations of the Interna- tional Tennis Federation’s (ITF) largest regional association. 46-year old former world #4 Kimiko Date is plotting another return to top level tennis follow- ing knee surgery that forced her off the circuit at the beginning of last year. U.S. player Taylor Fritz has signed to play with Head racquets. He uses the Head Graphene XT Radical frame. an ATP World Tour main draw singles match since Jimmy Connors in 1995 with a three-set win over Reilly Opelka in Houston recently. The 39-year old former world #2 is playing his last year on the circuit, and went on to extend his own record with match wins in Monte Carlo and Munich. Australian Open champion Henri Kontinen has become the first Finnish player to top the tennis rankings, clinching the ATP Doubles pole position after the event in Miami. The WTA Tour has strengthened its relationship with Porsche , which becomes the official and exclusive automobile partner of the organisa- tion and the title partner of the ‘Porsche Race to Singapore’, the qualifying rankings for the season-ending WTA Finals. Grigor Dmitrov and Simona Halep each Roland Garros has announced a 12% prize claimed $200,000 with wins at the inaugural Tie Break Tens event in Madrid last week. Wimbledon organisers have also an- Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. of money increase for the forthcoming edition of the tournament, with a total fund of €36 million. nounced a significant prize money increase of £3.5 million. The singles champions will leave SW19 with £2.2 million, double the amount taken by the 2011 winners of the tournament. Baltimore, Md., has acquired theassets of Tennis Media Company, the owner of Tennis.com, TENNIS magazine and Tennis Industry magazine. The acquisition creates a unified media platform with Tennis Channel, which Sinclair purchased in March 2016. 15