Hingis U.S. Open 2nd round pics

Definitely not ones I was hoping to see, I think that black outfit turned out to be bad luck. All pics from hingis.org

Martina Hingis ousted in 2nd round of U.S. Open!!

I can't believe this! I'm in total shock right now, she lost to a French player ranked in the 100's, Virginie Razzano. In 2 sets 6/2 6/4. And again I just cannot believe it, this is the earliest that Hingis has lost in the U.S. Open since the beginning of her career I think.

She just could not hold her serve at all tonight. The player really wasn't that great, Hingis just could not hold her serve in the first set. She only held it once in the first. Her first serve percentage was at 54% and only went up slightly toward the end of the second set. Another thing I noticed was that she was really rushing especially in the first set, very unlike her.

She fought back in the second set at 5/1 and brought it to 5/4 but just could not do it. I was really hoping she could turn it around in that last point. I'm not sure what happened I'm really disappointed, but mostly surprised. I don't think Hingis herself believes how badly she was playing today, it was just not her day.

It's really too bad she's out. I think she had a real shot this year but hopefully with more match play in the coming months she'll get better, and improve her match toughness and concentration. If she stays healthy and as fit as she is at the moment I have no doubt she'll win some grand slams next year.

Now I'm off to watch the Agassi match although with the way things have gone tonight, I'm not sure I wanna see that either.

Hingis U.S. Open first round pics

Love the mischievous smile:D.

As promised from hingis.org

Also click here for a nice Yahoo article on the match:D

Martina Hingis moves to round 2 at U.S. Open

But what a tough match against Chinese Shuai Peng. Martina lost the first set, but really pulled her game up in the second and became a lot more aggressive. She made some amazing shots from what I have read.

I was not able to see the match unfortunately due to USA Network and TSN showing other players matches in between Martina's, it was so frustrating!. I had to rely on the official US Open site live scoring system lol. And of course they had to show the entire Serena Williams match while Hingis was playing as well.

Like I give a hoot how well Serena does in this tournament. I only saw Hingis play a total of 4 games in the first 2 sets. The Chinese player really made her run around in the first set, but in the end Martina prevailed in 3 sets 4-6 6-1 6-3.

So glad she's through, I was a little worried at one point, but it's good for Martina to have a tough first round match. I think it'll help her against the tougher players later in the week. Now I just hope I get to see this match at some point on some other channel. If not I'll just hope that no Americans play tomorrow, so I can see Martina play in her 2nd round match (no offense to all my American readers, but I really wanna see Martina play). Hopefully it'll be a little easier then this one, so she can finish early and get some well deserved rest on Friday.

I'll have some article match summaries as well as some photos later in the day;). Martina is wearing my favourite outfit, the orange coloured shirt with a white skirt this time. I will say it again the woman knows fashion.

Martina Hingis practicing in the rain:)

I'm bored still waiting for Martina to start playing, it's been a long wait lol. So I decided to post some pics:D of Martina practicing yesterday in the rain. Now that's dedication to the game!. Notice her mom moving around her with the squeegee in the first pic lol (the person in blue shorts;). Pics are from hingis.org of course.

Rain delayed play till tomorrow

Well, Martina did not play today which means she'll have to pull double duty in the next couple of days. But I'm sure she can handle it. As for the rest well, they were supposedly going to show the match with Mauresmo as well as James Blake (if it stopped raining).

But I don't think it happened, all I kept seeing as I flipped the channel was the Andre Agassi/James Blake quarter final match from 2005. I don't really care if those matches got underway to be honest, by 8pm I was too busy watching Celebrity Duets:D. Lucy Lawless kicked butt!:D (musically of course;).

My guess is though that no one played and everyone will have to finish tomorrow.

C'est La Vie.

More rain at the U.S. Open

Rain delay continues, it stopped for about 45 minutes and play resumed but the rain has returned. I'm trying to stay positive but I don't think this day of play will finish. I think day 2 will carry on to day 3 unfortunately. And it's looking more likely that Martina's match will be moved to tomorrow.

I really hate this every time I'm really looking forward to a match, something always happens. Darn it!. Hopefully some more matches will be played before 7 o'clock this evening, but it's looking very iffy at the moment.

Here we go with another rain delay

Well it was another rain delay today at Flushing Meadows, play was suppose to start at 11am it started around 2:30 pm.

They better not postpone Hingis's match till tomorrow, she has to have a day off just like everyone else. It looks like it might happen though, especially since we have Nadal and Serena playing today. I have a feeling those matches will take forever. Hopefully Martina will have a nice easy opponent.

Oh, and I forgot to mention this last night glad to see Lindsay Davenport back and doing well she made it to her second round yesterday easily.

I never used to like Lindsay when she was at the top, but in recent years she's kind of grown on me so I hope she sticks around at least to take out people like Serena or Sharapova.

Andre Agassi moves through to 2nd round of U.S. Open!

Wow! is all I can say about this match. For a 36 year old guy Andre's still got it. Amazing. He played an amazing marathon 3.30 hour four setter.

Three of which went into a tiebreak. Then in the 3rd set Andre was down 4/0 and he came back and won the third set in a tiebreak. From then on he just stepped it up and was dominant through out the rest of the set winning the match 6/7 7/6 7/6 6/2.

I also have to say his opponent Andre Pavel give it all he had, this match was worthy of a final and it was only the first round!. I don't think we'll see anything better in the first round on the men's side then this match.

It was great seeing Andre's whole family in the players box. Including wife Steffi Graff who was on pins and needles the whole entire time lol and his cute kids. Jayden and Jazz are just adorable.

I know that he's got a tough nearly impossible road ahead but I hope he can do it I hope he gets to the final, it would just be so great for him to win his last grand slam before retiring.

I wish him all the best on Thursday and hope he continues all the way to the final.

Here is a Yahoo article on the match:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/29082006/6/n-sports-agassi-survives-marathon-roddick-fire.html

Serena unworried about limited preparation

The title of this article says it all, but man I really don't like some of the comments she makes. That's probably a huge part of why I've never liked Serena she always comes off so full of herself.

Venus in my opinion is always a lot more humble, but Serena goes way overboard. It's mostly the last quote I have a problem with the "I haven't looked at the draw, I don't care it doesn't matter" bit sounds like she's totally sure she's gonna win the thing or something. I don't know it's just weird.

Personally I don't see her getting that far anyway especially now that Lindsay Davenport is back.

The only thing good about this article is the photo of Steffi and Andre.

And of course so you know what the heck I'm going on about here is the aforementioned article:
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/26082006/6/n-sports-serena-unworried-limited-preparation.html

Celebrity Duets new reality show

Produced by none other then American Idol's Mr. mean himself Simon Cowell. Normally I wouldn't bother writing about a reality show. Since I hate almost all of them with the exception of American Idol and Amazing Race, but I thought I would for the benefit of people who maybe haven't heard about it yet.

This new show is very similar to Dancing with Celebrities, but in this case the show takes established singers and pairs them together with celebrities who are outside of the music industry. The established singers basically become their coaches throughout the competition.

They will then perform live in front of a studio audience and with a panel of judges. The people at home vote for the best duet, the winner gets one hundred thousand dollars for their favourite charity. The host is Wayne Brady (Who's Line is it Anyway) and the judges are David Foster, Marie Osmond and Little Richard.

Some of the singers include, (and this is the best part) people like, Cyndi Lauper, Smoky Robinson, Belinda Carlisle, Peter Frampton, Richard Marx, Macy Gray, Micheal Bolton, Dionne Warwick, Brian McKnight, Patti LaBelle, Chaka Khan and many more.

The 8 competing celebrities are, Lucy Lawless (Xena), Chris Jericho, Lea Thompson, Alfonso Ribeiro (Fresh Prince), Cheech Marin; 2004 Olympic Gold Medal-winning gymnast Carly Patterson, Jai Rodriguez, (Queer Eye), Hal Sparks (Queer as Folk).

The show starts this Tuesday August 29 at 8pm EST on Fox.

Of course to the readers of this blog it should be no shock or secret that my main reason for even watching this is because of Lucy Lawless. It'll be great for other people to see what only Xena fans have known for years. Lucy can really sing!;). Oh, and yeah I guess getting to hear all those great singers on one show doesn't hurt either:D.

For more info on the show you can check out Fox's official Celebrity Duets site:
http://www.fox.com/celebrityduets/bios/index.htm

also here are a couple of related articles:
http://www.accesshollywood.com/news/ah1242.shtml

http://www.contactmusic.com/news.nsf/article/osmond%20joins%20celebrity%20duets%20as%20judge_1006048

Pluto no longer the 9th planet

I wanted to post about this yesterday, but Blogger was having some problems. The planet Pluto has been demoted to a "dwarf planet" and ripped of it's planetary status. Because it did not meet the new definition of what a planet is.

All I can say is I feel sorry for all those librarians and everyone who will now have to go back and make a note about Pluto no longer being a planet lol.

Planet UB313 nicknamed "Xena" and it's orbiting moon "Gabrielle" by one of the CalTech's planetary scientists Mike Brown, will also join Pluto as one of the "dwarf planets". The word is still out on whether the planet will keep this name. I for one am all for it:D.

Here are some related articles:

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Xena_Awarded_Dwarf_Planet_Status_999.html

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3776636a1860,00.html

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-pluto25aug25,0,2108884,full.story?coll=la-home-headlines

http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060825/NEWS/608250346/1051

I scream for Google ice cream:)

The Google campus wasn't spared from the recent California heat wave, but we did have a secret weapon to beat back the sun - specially-made Google ice cream desserts from IT'S IT. If you're not from the Bay Area you might be tempted to call an It's It just another ice cream sandwich. But you'd be oh, so wrong. A scoop of ice cream between two old-fashioned oatmeal cookies dipped in chocolate? This is no ordinary dessert.

And indeed the Google version is no ordinary IT'S IT. Google chef Nate Keller worked with the fine folks at IT'S IT to produce a natural, locally sourced, trans-fat-free rendition of their excellent treat. Served only in our Mountain View cafe, it's even got a Google logo on the wrapper. Now, if I could only figure out how to keep a few from melting on my drive home to San Francisco


http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2006/08/i-scream-for-google-ice-cream.html

How cool is this? makes you wonder what they'll think of next lol. Just another reason why if I was qualified I would love to work at that company:D. Shouldn't have looked at that photo again though, now I really want a Google ice cream sandwich lol.

Kim Clijsters may return to Tennis sooner then expected

Well good news for Kim Clijsters fans looks like she may recover sooner then originally thought. She had another MRI scan this Wednesday, which suggested that the injury she suffered may heal more quickly.

It is now being said that Kim will be out for six weeks as opposed to 2 months so that's a huge difference. I hope she indeed recovers quickly and is back on the tour before the end of the year.

Here is the Yahoo source article:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/23082006/6/n-sports-injured-clijsters-return-early.html

Hingis #9 ranking confirmed

Found an article which confirms Martina has moved to the number 9 spot, not that I really needed a confirmation. What I found interesting is that the WTA ranking only went into effect yesterday when they said it was going to be Monday.

That's a little weird, I think the commentators for Rogers Cup got their info screwed up. This tournament didn't turn out to be a total loss for Martina she moved to the #9 spot despite loosing the final.

And according to the article she's not far from #8. I think by the end of the U.S. Open Hingis might knock fellow Swiss Patty Schnyder out of her number 8 spot.

Again I just gotta say, it's really amazing how far Martina has come in just eight months, very impressive.

The article also has the points of all the other top 10 players calculated as of yesterday, you can check it out here:

http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_1774972,00070002.htm

What are Martina's chances at the U.S. Open?

Well now that Rogers Cup is finished and the U.S. Open is coming up in a week I wanna know how well do you guys think Martina Hingis will do there?. How far do you think she'll get?. So vote;).

Martina Hingis Rogers Cup final pics:)

Not the photos I had hoped to post, but Martina still looks great in the black outfit. I think this is only the second time she has worn it. Again all pics are from hingis.org.

Ivanovic upsets Hingis in the final at Rogers Cup!

Wow I can't believe Martina lost:( But I gotta hand it to this Anna person she played well, and she's definitely got a lot of potential. She held her nerve the whole match playing very aggressively. She beat Hingis in straight sets 6/2 6/3.

So I think she'll stick around. As for Hingis well it just wasn't her day I guess, and yes many will say that she didn't play that great, or she wasn't aggressive enough. And that's partly the reason but the other reason is the other player was just too good. Even Martina herself said it in her speech.

I also think because this was the first time these two played, Martina didn't really have a strategy against her, where as her opponent did. But I'm sure Martina will be back next year at Rogers Cup. Better then ever and will kick some more butt.

She received some great applause from the crowd they really appreciated her all this week the only player to actually stick around in this tournament.

And hey there's always the U.S. Open for Hingis. Clijsters has confirmed she's not playing and Martina has moved into the#9 spot as of today, putting her at #8 at the Open so a huge advantage there. She won't have to face the Sharapova's or William's until at least the quarters.

So I wish her lots of luck there. And I'm looking forward to watching her play next Monday. Again it didn't happen this year, but this was a nice accomplishment of getting to the final and putting herself back in the top 10.

Also I noticed that the Rogers Cup trophy has changed this year it's now a glass tennis racquet looks very cool. Oh, also I love Martina's little comment about her speech and the fact that she hasn't done many of these in a while so she's a little rusty lol. You gotta love her even when she loses she's a class act.

It's official Rogers Cup final moved to Monday

Yep, they finally made a decision and moved it to Monday at 2pm. Took them long enough, sigh..oh well. As long as Martina wins I will be happy:).

Here is the confirmation from the Rogers Cup site:
http://www.rogerscup.com/3/en/news/2006/finale2.asp

And the waiting continues

Geez! it is raining again in Montreal, it stopped for about 45 minutes around 4 o'clock and they were able to finish the semi-final. It will be Anna Ivanovic vs. Hingis but not till the damn rain stops. At this rate I don't think we'll see this match at all today they might as well give up and move it till tomorrow .

I would say if the rain doesn't stop by ten the match will be moved. Darn it! I really wanna see this final especially since these two have never played one another before I wanna know how Hingis handles it. This is turning out to be one frustrating day!.

2nd semi still not started:(

Well the second semi-final between Safina and Ivonovic was scheduled for 11am seeing as it is now 12:40 I guess that's not happening and I guess the final will be pushed back as well. It'll probably be moved to Monday now, although the site says it's still happening Sunday but the time has yet to be confirmed. Rain must still be going down in buckets, this is so frustrating I wanna see this final!.

2nd Rogers Cup Semi-Final postponed due to rain

Well looks like the match between Dinara Safina and Ana Ivanovic will be played Sunday morning at 11:00am. The winner of that match will go on to play Martina Hingis at 1pm the same day.

I think Hingis's chances of winning the title have greatly increased. Because which ever player wins that match they will be quite tired by the time they step on court to play Martina. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping this works in Martina's favour and she captures the title without too many problems. Again I can't wait to see her holding the Rogers Cup trophy:D.

Hingis Rogers Cup Semi-Final pics:)

Best pic of the tournament:)

Pics from http://www.wtatour.ru/index.php?showtopic=8522&st=80 more to come later.

Martina Hingis is in the finals at Rogers Cup!

Martina won the first set fairly easily 6/3 she was leading 3/1 in the second when her opponent retired with a right forearm injury. Now of course that's not the way any player wants to win a semi-final match, but hey what are you gonna do. And honestly I think since Martina was leading she would have won it anyway.

This actually gives her a nice break, it gives her plenty of time to rest before tomorrow's final. I could tell she was tired, she wasn't running as much and her serve was a little more sloppy, but understandably so.

Martina herself admitted she was still tired from last night and having to play during the day in the heat is not fun. So I'm happy for her at least she got a break and moves to the finals easily. She deserves it after last night's win anyway.

I do have to say I feel a little sorry for her opponent Anna Chankvetadze because I'm sure she would have put on more of a match if she was up to it and I don't think it was right for the crowd to boo her. Actually I found that quite rude.

In any case congrats to Martina! and all the best tomorrow, I hope it is her holding that trophy fingers crossed.

Another incentive Martina has for winning this title aside from the trophy and money is her ranking if she wins tomorrow she will become the #9 player in the world. Guaranteeing a #8 rank at the U.S. Open.

Which would be of great help since she wouldn't have to face any of the really tough players like Mauresmo in the early rounds. She moves into the top ten spot as of Monday anyway thanks to her win against Kuznetsova.

She knocked Lindsay Davenport out of her top ten spot. Pretty amazing I don't think anyone expected her to be in the top 10 after only 8 months. Very cool.

Couple of more quarter final pics:)

This is my favourite pic:)

And of course a report of the semi-final later this afternoon;).

And here are some pics of Hingis from the quarters

More pics to come later in the day from hingis.org

In the mean time here are a couple of great match articles:

http://www.rogerscup.com/3/en/news/2006/hingis18.asp

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20060818.tennis19/BNStory/Sports/home

She did it! Hingis is in the semi-finals at Rogers Cup

Where do I start? what a match! now first of all I know that a lot of people may say that Kuznetsova wasn't in her best form and that's why Hingis won. To those people I say, hell no! Hingis was absolutely great tonight she worked hard for every point and deserved the win.

This match was worthy of a final not a quarter final. I think playing those two really tough matches to get her to the quarters really prepared her. Hingis herself said in her post-match interview it helped loosen her up.

All credit to Hingis for really raising her game boy, when she steps up she really steps up. She knew she would have to against Kuznetsova and did exactly that so I have to applaud her for that.

Things were really working for Hingis tonight and she was really on her game, she was even serving at 70% . The other key thing was she played such a clean game I think all together in both sets she had a total of only 14 maybe 15 unforced errors to Kuznetsova's 30+.

She was once again running down every ball and used Kuznetsova's pace to her advantage and got her off balance several times in the match. She threw in some magnificent drop shots too, and again held her serve during all important points.

Even when she was broken she broke right back. She even got lucky with Kuznetsova double faulting in the tie break at 6/4 giving her the set. Of course I think she would have won it either way. And I think winning the first set really give her confidence.

It was great to see her smiling on her winning points too, she hasn't done that much this tournament.

I like the fact that she didn't get down on herself and think about certain points too much. Just let it go and played her game. She knew that with Kuznetsova winning wouldn't be easy, but at the same time she relished the challenge. That's what she always does the harder the player the harder and better she plays. Because she loves outsmarting her opponent. She even said in her post-match interview she loves playing Kuznetsova.

I also have to mention I loved the variety Hingis demonstrated in this match, it felt like the Hingis of old. Besides the drop shots she even made a magnificent lob and of course perfect volley's all throughout. And how sweet was it for Hingis to have a triple match point? doesn't happen often. But again she really pulled out the stops tonight and deserves every bit of that win. And she knows it.

I have to admit I had my doubts about Hingis moving on tonight, but I love that she proved me wrong:D.

So now she goes on to the semi's to play unseeded Russian Anna Chakvetadze should be interesting, but I don't see Hingis having any problems especially if she plays the way she did tonight.

And just as an end note to those who say Hingis might get the title by default on the count of so many seeded players pulling out. I again say, hell no! winning against Kuznetsova wasn't exactly a walk in the park. So if she wins this which I'm almost certain she will she completely deserves it. Just by winning this match.

She won the match in two sets too, a lot of people said it would take 3 so huge credit to her for pulling it off in two. Allowing her to get more rest before tomorrow. She won the match 7/6 6/3.

All the best to her tomorrow I can't wait to see her holding the Rogers Cup trophy on Sunday.:)

More Hingis 3rd round Rogers Cup pics

As promised:D from hingis.org.

Hingis 3rd round Rogers Cup pics

All pics from hingis.org, more pics to come tomorrow;). I forgot to mention yesterday I love this orange outfit:).

Hingis through to the quarters at Rogers Cup

Now that's what I'm talking about! the master is back at work.:D I don't know what happened to her on Tuesday but that was not Hingis, this was more like her. I could tell right from the first couple of games she was going to play better.

One indication was she chased down a lot more balls, of course that could have been because the other player didn't have as deep a shot as Hingis's previous opponent but still much more impressive. Most importantly of all her variety was back drop shots, volley's, and some amazing cross courts. This is what was completely missing on Tuesday.

And I think one other thing Martina did better in this match is anticipate her opponents shots. I think that's what truly won her the match. Through her anticipation she made some incredible shots, it was wonderful to watch. This was a fully entertaining match. Much better then most I've seen so far, except for maybe Nicole Pratt yesterday.

Martina seemed much more focused today and really on her game. She only had about 8 or 9 unforced errors and was able to convert on the most important points. Although closing out the match took a little longer, took her 2 times before she was able to serve it out. She was leading 5/1 and her opponent broke her to get back to 5/4 where Martina finally served it out 6/4.

The first set was quite long with both players holding their serve for most of it. Martina broke Hantuchova at 3 all but Hantuchova broke right back. She was leading 4/5 and 40 love, then made 4 unforced errors in a row allowing Hingis to save set point and take the next 2 games winning the first set 7/5.

Again very nice match much cleaner then the one on Tuesday. I'm sure even Martina is a lot more happy with this performance. So now Hingis goes on to face Svetlana Kuznetsova tomorrow night.

That's gonna be one hell of a match. I think Hingis will have to bring her game up another notch to win it, but tonight was a step in the right direction. All the best to her tomorrow, I have a feeling it'll be a toughie.

Oh, and a little update on Kim apparently the injury she had is not the same she had surgery on. She tore a different ligament, there will be further tests run and she'll give the final word on whether or not she'll play at the U.S. Open in about a weeks time.

Kim Clijsters out of the U.S. Open:(

Well, Kim had an MRI today and unfortunately it's been announced she's not playing at the U.S. Open or the Fed Cup this year. And she's out of commission for at least the next two months.

Here is an article confirming it.

Kim Clijsters out of Rogers Cup!

I was just watching the Kim Clijsters match with Canadian Stephanie Dubois and a shocking thing occurred Kim injured her left wrist. She had it taped and continued to play, during one point she fell on her injured wrist and had to retire. This is the same wrist she had surgery on in June of 2004.

This is terrible for Kim, I feel so sorry for her. With the U.S. Open only two weeks away there will be lots of question marks and whether she can recover and is able to play. So now with her out the field is really open for anyone to take the title.

Of course I would love for Hingis to take it but she's really gonna have to raise the level of her game for that to happen. And tomorrow will be a really tough match for her playing Hantuchova.

Again I'm just so sorry for Clisjster she is one of my other favourite players aside from Hingis and she's been having such a good year. I would hate for this to ruin her career and be the reason for her retirement.

TSN will have a post match conference with Kim as it becomes available I'm gonna try to catch it and see what Kim has to say.

Here is a Yahoo article related to Kim's injury:
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/16082006/3/sports-clijsters-bows-rogers-cup.html

Martina Hingis 2nd round Rogers Cup pics pt. 2