Turkish Delight: WTA Championships

After visiting Boca Raton, Los Angeles, New York, Munich, Madrid and Doha since it was first staged back in 1972, the TEB-BNP Paribas WTA Championships – the women’s tour’s flagship event – will touch down in Istanbul this October for the 39th edition of the season-ending finale.

The event’s three-year residency in Qatar came to an end in 2010 and after a 2011 calendar that sees the women compete at 53 events and four Grand Slams played in 33 different countries it will be Istanbul’s Sinam Erdem Stadium – the venue until 2013 – where this year’s stories will unfold.

The qualification criteria is simple. After competing for 11 months across the globe, the top eight players in the Race to the WTA Championships will book their tickets to Turkey. Likewise, the top four doubles teams in the world will also be on board for the six-day, $4.9 million extravaganza which will see the 2011 champion walk away with at least $1.35 million, a winner’s cheque that could be increased to $1.55 million if they come through their three round robin matches prior to the knockout stages unbeaten.

Ever since a 17-year-old Chris Evert won the inaugural event in Boca Raton, Florida, the WTA has been keen to take their end-of-season showpiece to as many territories as possible. “Having the TEB-BNP Paribas WTA Championships in such a fantastic city like Istanbul presents a great opportunity to showcase the best of women’s tennis and spur interest in the sport in a new market,” says Stacey Allaster, Chairman and CEO of the WTA. “We’ve had a continuous strategy to take our year-end Championships to key, new markets and rotate “the best of women’s tennis” around the world. We’ve been really excited about the opportunity to bring our year-end Championships to one of the most youthful markets in the world since we made the original announcement in June 2007.”

One of this season’s form players, Belarusian world No.4 Victoria Azarenka is on track to qualify, currently occupying fifth spot in the race, and along with Jelena Jankovic and Vera Zvonareva visited Istanbul in early June to help promote the event. “It was really interesting to see how excited people are about the Championships there – we had a lot of attention and coverage so it looks like they’re going to put on a great event with lots of spectators,” the 22-year-old said. “I didn’t expect such a big party, so it was really cool to celebrate with the Turkish people in a beautiful city and I just hope I can get there now.”

Azarenka won the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami this spring and reached her first Grand Slam semi-final at Wimbledon. She says she’s beginning to reap the rewards from years of hard work. “I’ve been having some consistent results, I have a great team around me and I think I’m getting more mature in every way in the game – physically and mentally. Physically, the game is really becoming harder and harder so I’ve been working a lot on staying very strong and fit. Mentally, I’ve just learnt to keep believing in myself and keep playing with the same attitude, fighting for every ball.”

Azarenka sits behind Caroline Wozniacki, Wimbledon champion Petra Kvitova, French Open champion Li Na, and Maria Sharapova in the race just over halfway through the season, but whoever makes the final eight, organisers are confident that the Turkish public will support the tournament by filling the Sinam Erdem Stadium, which hosted basketball’s world championships in 2010 and will stage the indoor athletics world championships in 2012.

“The interest is huge in Turkey,” says the President of the Turkish Tennis Federation, Ayda Uluc. “It will be the first time in the history of the nation that such a big tennis event is going to be held. Fans of all sports are interested, not only tennis fans. We are doing a lot to promote this championship. With a population of some 70 million we should be able to fill the stands of the Sinan Erdem Arena.”

For the visitor, of course, Istanbul is an easy sell. Whether it’s great restaurants, bars, galleries or clubs – or for the culture vultures Ottoman mosques – it has it all. “Istanbul is a great city with lots of diversity,” Uluc adds. “The girls will love it here.”

'Tennis Tourist: Turkish Delight' featured in the September 2011 issue of tennishead magazine. For more details about the magazine and how to subscribe, click here.