Why Is The US Open Still Using Different Balls For Men And Women?
Why Is The US Open Still Using Different Balls For Men And Women? Reigning world number one Iga Swiatek called the balls used at the US Open “horrible” during a news conference at the Western & Southern Open this week, and Women and men use different tennis balls, especially at the major tournaments. However, this is the only Grand Slam tournament which doesn’t use the same ball for each player.
I don’t understand why they are different than men’s balls. I don’t know, but likely around 15 years ago women were experiencing elbow injuries due to the weight of the balls and they switched over to women’s made ones. However, I believe that this is no longer the case because we’ve seen massive physical improvements in female athletes. Plus, it’s not common for us to get to buy those balls so sometimes when I’m practicing with US Open balls at home, I am actually practicing with a men’s ball
Some of these problems are hard to understand, but everybody faces these same problems. We’re trying to work through them at the moment.
The balls have been used in the lead-in swing at several tournaments this season including the Western and Southern Opens last week, and last week’s Canadian Open. The 37-match winstreak Swiatek had earlier this season is now over after he lost to Madison Keys in the round of 16 in Cincinnati, then dropped a match to Coco Vandeweghe in Toronto.
Some players have complained about the gap in playing skills, and Swiatek said that she and Badosa, who is ranked No. 4, had talked with Tennis Australia CEO Steve Simon last year and asked if they could use the same ball as the men.
I’m not sure if there are any issues with continued sponsorship, but as for me personally, since we saw the developments in Ukraine, I refocused on something else. When it came to tennis though, the balls just didn’t seem to work well for me from the start.
Amy Binder, the WTA’s senior vice president of global communications, said the WTA was listening to player concerns and would explore.
With the WTA now modifying its tennis ball to be extra duty, more players are expressing interest in this change. This is because the regular tennis ball has been causing injuries and rather than risk further injury to players, they are willing to try a new kind of ball. With this new experiment, it remains unclear how many players will continue using it.
Professional tennis player and former world No. 1 Ashleigh Barty has publicly shared her displeasure with the unequal ball distribution in tennis. After winning the Australian Open earlier this year, coach Craig Tyzzer told reporters that Barty will never win the US Open with the current equipment. She retired shortly after being defeated in the second round of Wimbledon.
A round during the US Open did not go as planned for Ash Barty, who competed with a gut racket. All of her matches did not go her way as she barely touched the ball. The ball is different than a normal club in that it’s bigger and lighter. However, both players made substantial improvements and won their respective finals easily. With such innovation from both players, there was no surprise in the outcome of this event.
With no US Open women’s champions winning a second major title in the previous seven years, Swiatek is even to fill the breach with three titles.