| Women's Tennis Association |
Article Index for Women's |
Website Links For Womens |
Information AboutWomen's Tennis Association |
|
The Women's Tennis Association, is also known as the '''WTA Tour''', and is to women's tennis what the ATP is to men's tennis. In 2005 the WTA changed its name into '''The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour'''. The Women's Tennis Association was begun in Houston, Texas when the inaugural ''Virginia Slims'' event was won on 23 September 1970 . Billie Jean King was a major figure in the early days of the WTA. TOURNAMENT CATEGORIES # Grand Slam Events #Season-ending championships ( WTA Tour Championships ): with Three Million Dollars ($3,000,000) prize money. #Tier tournaments: ## Tier I (minimum prize money of $1,340,000): There are ten (10) Tier I Tournaments. ## Tier II (minimum prize money of $600,000): There are sixteen (16) Tier II Tournaments ## Tier III (minimum prize money of $175,000): There are seventeen (17) Tournaments in this Tier. ## Tier IV (minimum prize money of $145,000): There are twelve (12) in this Tier. RANKING The organization releases a weekly ranking of the players's performance in the tour. Players' ranking points are counted how they fare on individual rounds of a tournament (round points). The following table gives the distribution of "round points":
This is a list of players who have achieved the number one position in singles since the rankings' inception in 1975 : RECORDS Title Leaders in the Open Era # Martina Navratilova: 167 # Chris Evert: 154 # Steffi Graf: 107 # Margaret Court: 92 # Evonne Goolagong Cawley: 68 # Billy Jean King: 67 # Virginia Wade: 55 # Monica Seles: 53 # Lindsay Davenport: 51 # Martina Hingis: 40 # Conchita Martinez: 33 # Venus Williams: 33 # Tracy Austin: 30 # Kim Clijsters: 30 Most Titles in a Season ''Before 1990 (15 +): # 21 - Margaret Court (1970) # 18 - Margaret Court (1969, 1973) # 17 - Billy Jean King (1971) # 16 - Chris Evert (1974, 1975) # 16 - Martina Navratilova (1983) # 15 - Evonne Goolagong Cawley (1970) # 15 - Martina Navratilova (1982) ''Since 1990 (8 +): # 12 - Martina Hingis (1997) # 10 - Monica Seles (1991, 1992) # 10 - Steffi Graf (1990, 1993) # 9 - Monica Seles (1990) # 9 - Arantxa Sanchez Vicario (1994) # 9 - Steffi Graf (1995) # 9 - Martina Hingis (2000) # 9 - Kim Clijsters (2003) # 9 - Kim Clijsters (2005) # 8 - Steffi Graf (1992) # 8 - Justine Henin-Hardenne (2003) # 8 - Serena Williams (2002) Oldest Winners of a Title # Billie Jean King: 39 yrs, 7 mos, 23 days (1983 Birmingham) # Martina Navratilova: 37 yrs, 4 mos, 2 days (1994 Paris Indoors) # Margaret Court: 34 yrs, 4 mos, 26 days (1976 Melbourne) Youngest Winners of a Title # Tracy Austin: 14 yrs, 28 days (1977 Portand) # Andrea Jaeger: 14 yrs, 7 mos, 14 days (1980 Las Vegas) # Kathy Rinaldi: 14 yrs, 6 mos, 24 days (1981 Kyoto) Match Win Leaders in Open Era # Martina Navratilova: 1442 # Chris Evert: 1304 # Steffi Graf: 900 # Virginia Wade: 839 # Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario: 759 # Conchita Martinez: 711 # Evonne Goolagong Cawley : 704 # Lindsay Davenport: 703 # Billy Jean King: 695 # Gabriela Sabatini: 632 # Pam Shriver: 625 # Helena Sukova: 614 # Nathalie Tauziat: 606 Longest Winning Streaks # 74 - Martina Navratilova (1984) # 66 - Steffi Graf (1989-90) # 58 - Martina Navratilova (1986-87) # 57 - Margaret Court (1972-73) # 55 - Chris Evert (1974) # 54 - Martina Navratilova (1983-84) Calendar-year Grand Slams
Non calendar-year Grand Slams
Career Grand Slams (year indicates first victory in a particular Slam)
Grand Slam Title Leaders D=Doubles; MD= Mixed Doubles OTHER TRIVIA
SEE ALSO
EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|