.alt> view- Sony Ericsson Open

I can't quite put my finger on all of the reasons why I love going to tennis championships like the Sony Ericsson Open which I attended this past weekend. Could it be the fact that you can really get up close to professionals...and really observe their form? Or maybe it's just the coolness of walking around and seeing tennis idols just hanging about amongst the crowd....kicking back and enjoying themselves between their own matches.
A tournament like this one has many matches going on at the same time. The top players like Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova might be playing in the big "stadium" while others play in smaller venues. You can just walk around and go in and out of matches as you see fit. At the same time players that go on later in the day can be warming up on the many practice courts spread out throughout the grounds. This really is a treat because you can be as close as ten feet away from the greatest names in tennis. These folks can really smack the ball. You get a sense of both the grace and the power of the professionals when you are just steps away from them.
While a lot of my friends chose to sit in the stadium and watch the big guns like Andy Roddick, I preferred to stay at the courts where I could get up close or watch the practices. My favorite players are the up and comers who just don't have the name recognition (yet) like Nicholas Almagro from Spain and
Shahar Pe'er from Israel. Yes Israel! A funny little side note is that you can always figure out where Shahar is playing because every time she loses a point you hear one or two stray "Oy vays!" screamed out from the bleachers. I felt a little tinge of Jewish guilt when I left her match early to check out Nicolas.
Which leads me to a unique aspect of this tournament in particular. Being in Miami there is a wonderful international flavor as people from all over the world come to root for players from their own country. It really is a lot of fun.

Anyway, I will stop boring you with my thoughts and these darn pictures but I am just all psyched about tennis right now. This tournament gets me excited about playing and I came back and smacked the ball harder than I have been doing so I am getting myself in the right frame of mind for the tournament I will be playing in a couple of weeks....