Daily Bagel: Esther Vergeer retires
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghLhUGg5EF8
The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.
• Video: Roger Federer's all bundled up as he promotes the ABN Amro World Tennis Tournament in Rotterdam this week.
• Esther Vergeer is retiring after an illustrious career in wheelchair tennis to focus on promoting sports for people with disabilities. Vergeer, 31, ended her career on a 10-year, 470-match unbeaten streak, facing match point once in that time. What an absolute legend.
"I'm hugely proud of my performances, my titles, and can look back on my career with a great feeling," Vergeer said at the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament in Rotterdam. "Keeping going would not add anything."
• Speaking to Tennis.com, Justin Gimelstob says he's confident the ATP Board of Directors will do the right thing and vote for the proposed Indian Wells prize money increase. Gimelstob is one of the three ATP player representatives who voted for the increase.
• Expect a lot of nostalgia this week as San Jose, Calif., hosts the SAP Open for the last time before the tournament moves to Brazil. Here's what Peter Bodo had to say at Tennis.com about the tournament's rich history and ultimate demise:
The interesting thing to me is how completely all that history and even general public interest seems to have dried up and blown away. I mean, this was no one-off tournament that someone tried to ram down our throats. It was an organic event, with over a century of history and tradition. Can the explanation for the demise of this event be as simple as, the game "moving on"? Is the present shortfall of top U.S. players enough to doom events like San Jose?
I have problems with that theory. Granted, the U.S. still has four premium events, including one on the west coast (Indian Wells). But it’s still hard to imagine that a state as tennis-friendly as California can’t also support at least one summer tournament; it suggests some critical failure of vision somewhere along the line.
• ESPN.com's Kamakshi Tandon looks into why the American women generally own the WTA's biggest serves.
• From BBC.com, Roger Federer wants more blood testing in tennis. He says he wasn't asked for a sample after losing in the Australian Open semifinals.
• The Grandstand has another hilarious "Tennis Players Facebook chat about..." mock-up, this time regarding Rafael Nadal's return. Be sure to take a close look at each player's avatar. Incredible attention to detail and tennis inside jokes here.
• The Slice has pictures of Nadal and others at the Brasil Open player party.
• For those keeping tabs, Bernard Tomic and his girlfriend broke up. In presumably unrelated news, Tomic lost in the first round of Rotterdam to Maria Sharapova's main squeeze, Grigor Dimitrov.
