Tennis & Timepieces - High Profile Venue for Watches
WORLDTEMPUS - 8 June 2011
The world-class tennis tournament in the heart of Paris seems to be the stage that tennis has set to show off players' and spectators' love of watches.
Rafael Nadal's spectacular win over Roger Federer in the finals of the tournament - his sixth French Open championship on the slow red clay in seven years - represents a continuation of Richard Mille's foray into high-profile ambassadorships. Confirming Mille's ever-accurate nose, world number one Nadal has been on a serious winning streak since first strapping the controversial RM 027 tourbillon to his sweaty wrist last spring.
Some watches played on the clay right along with the players. Richard Mille defeated Rolex in the finals - in every sense. While Nadal seems more than content to wear the ultra-light, ultra-expensive, and ultra-cool black tourbillon during play and practice, Rolex has not yet been able to convince Federer to don his flavor of the day while swatting the yellow felt ball.
Young TalentsFive-time French Open sponsor Longines has also not been able to convince its many spokesplayers to wear one of its watches while playing either. Asked about this, CEO Walter von Känel was unconcerned. "It's a personal choice," he said.
Longines sponsors a number of young talents in the tennis arena. This year, the brand put on the fairly lavish Future Tennis Aces program, which allowed sixteen under-13-year-old players from all over the world to come to Roland Garros for a week, partake in a tournament on the actual tournament grounds, and soak up the atmosphere of professional tennis.
Additionally, Longines also runs a program it calls the Rising Tennis Stars, which aims to support young tennis talents between the ages of 17 and 21 years as they develop their careers. These Rising Stars currently include Grigor Dimitrov, the 20-year-old number-one tennis player from Bulgaria, ranked number 64 in the ATP Tour rankings; Tiago Fernandes, Brazil's the number-one tennis player under 21 and currently ranked 392 on the ATP computer; Tsung-Hua Yang, the first player from Taiwan to be the number one junior player in the world, currently ranked 302 by the ATP; Sabine Lisicki of Germany, who reached a career high as number 22 in the WTA rankings in August 2009; Ryan Harrison (USA), who reached a career-high no. 7 in world junior rankings in 2008 and is currently ranked no. 119 on the ATP computer; 18-year-old Roberto Carballes Baena (Spain) is currently ranked number 446 by the ATP and number 11 on the ITF Junior World rankings; and Sai-Sai Zheng (China), currently ranked no. 275 on the WTA Tour, is one of the highest ranked 17-year-old players.
During Roland Garros, Longines also awarded former world number one Jim Courier with the Longines Prize for Elegance, which he received from Longines ambassador Andre Agassi. He received it as a tribute to his work with disadvantaged children, notably through his foundation Courier's Kids.
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