“It’s a dry heat, though”: These are the calming words we hear whenever the temperatures soar at the Australian Open. And it’s true, when you’re walking around in Melbourne, 100 degrees can feel less oppressive than, say, 90 degrees in muggy New York City. But I wouldn’t recommend trying to

LONDON—There’s always a new order being established, isn't there? There’s always a changing of the guard. It’s forever the end of an era—half the time, the era seems to be over before you knew it had begun. Every tournament with a new winner foretells the immediate demise of the player

That’s “thoughts” in Italian, not pennies. While custom has it that they're of equal value, thoughts are still, more than our offices or our cities or our houses, where we have to live. They're also where we watch a tennis tournament. Whether we're at an event or seeing it on

I found myself irresistibly drawn to the Grandstand again today, where Jo-Wilfried Tsonga was scheduled to play his first Grand Slam singles match since he scared the bee-jayzus out of Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open final at the end of January. The last time we saw Jo-Willy was way

Once again , greetings from California! After reading some Comments yesterday, I have learned that many of you really have never experienced LA in all its glory – so I'll give you a little background to go with your tennis. LA is, first and foremost, HUGE. One giant urban/suburban sprawl,

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) The latest from the Australian Open on Sunday (all times local): 12:20 a.m. (Monday). Roger Federer ensured he didn't have too late a night on Rod Laver Arena, beating David Goffin 6-2, 6-1, 6-4 to advance to the quarterfinals at Melbourne Park.The four-time Australian Open champion didn't

NEW YORK (AP) The Latest on the U.S. Open (all times local): 1:50 a.m. Eighth-seeded Madison Keys rallied from down a set and a break to outlast fellow American Alison Riske in a first-round U.S. Open match that ended at 1:48 a.m. Tuesday morning. Keys, who took a medical timeout

“It’s all about confidence.” If you’ve listened to a tennis player speak for more than a minute in your life, you’ve probably heard a variant of that sentence. Confidence is the Holy Grail and the ever-elusive X factor in this individual sport. It’s also the great democratic leveler. Even the

MELBOURNE—Amnesia and memory. A pair of contradictory attributes, vying for cooperation within the minds of Simona Halep and Caroline Wozniacki, the two women who today advanced to this year’s Australian Open final. Or better yet, is the struggle between forgetting and remembering less about holding these two together, and more

The tennis season is long, but like anything else that doesn’t involve your own daily 9 to 5 labor, it passes with disconcerting speed—“Time is a jet plane,” Bob Dylan sang, “it moves too fast.” Maybe it’s the scattershot, peak-and-valley nature of the early-year schedule—massive tournament to start, nothing for

Let’s back up and start with a tentative big-picture question: Is the roadmap working? In past summers, the word most frequently heard during the women’s summer season was one of the more depressing in tennis: “withdrawal.” Injuries and pullouts devastated the North American hard-court season and made the WTA look

NEW YORK (AP) — The Latest on the U.S. Open tennis tournament (all times local): ___ 12:35 a.m. Novak Djokovic will take his Grand Slam bid into the U.S. Open semifinals. Djokovic beat Matteo Berrettini 5-7, 6-2, 6-2, 6-3, moving two victories from becoming the first man to win all

NEW YORK (AP) — The Latest on the U.S. Open tennis tournament (all times local): 11:10 p.m. Novak Djokovic still has his Grand Slam chance. Pushed to a fifth set by Alexander Zverev, the top-seeded Djokovic won it 6-2 to advance to Sunday's U.S. Open final. Djokovic will play No.

I’ve never fully understood the question, “Which is the hardest tournament to win?” The French Open is the most popular answer, but in that case shouldn’t the question be, "What’s the most grueling tournament?" Or, "What tournament gets your socks the reddest?" When it comes to overall difficulty, aren’t all

Among the many fascinating facts surrounding Roger Federer is how often he loses skirmishes that are there for the taking or, at least, not far from his grasp. It happened again Sunday afternoon on the slow, high bouncing, hard courts at Indian Wells when he confronted a top-of-the-line Dominic Thiem

Greetings, Tribe, this is Steve from one door down. I’m filling in for a day for Pete. He’s away for a very good reason, of course—his niece’s wedding. I feel like I should make my identity clear from the start; the last time I did guest labor here on the

HIGHLIGHTS: Elena Rybakina's win over two-time Australian Open champion Victoria Azarenka

The red-clay road to Roland Garros was closed to all traffic due to the COVID-19 pandemic last year. Paths to glory in places like Monte Carlo, Madrid, Rome, Stuttgart and Budapest went untrodden. Even the French Open was postponed. Nary a pair of white socks emerged from the hotel dryer

It’s hard not to get up early here. Between the never-ending sun, the remnants of jet lag, and the sound of tennis balls being smacked outside my hotel window, I’ve been working on about 5-6 hours of sleep a night so far. Feels good, too—it’s amazing what you can get