Daily Bagel: French Open fashion
http://youtu.be/jMIJG6qWOoI
The Daily Bagel is your dose of the interesting reporting, writing and quipping from around the Internet.
• Video: Just another great Roger Federer compilation video.
• Here's what Federer, Rafael Nadal, Serena Williams, Maria Sharapova and other Nike-sponsored players will be wearing at the French Open. I have serious doubts about the Federer and Sharapova kits, but Serena's dress looks fantastic.
• Sharapova and Grigor Dimitrov get papped in Madrid.
• This isn't the Nadal we know, as The Wall Street Journal's Tom Perrotta writes.
• Despite the Rio Olympics committee's protests, the ITF demanded a 20,000-seat tennis stadium. And now the ITF is mad because Rio isn't delivering.
• Dinara Safina will announce her formal retirement next week at the Madrid Open, where she will present the trophy to the winner. Safina has not played since the 2011 Madrid Open. (Link in French.)
• ATP president Chris Kermode tells Bloomberg.com that he wants to see prize money increased on the Challenger tour. Well, sure, who doesn't? The question is whether the market will allow it.
Earlier this year, the ATP lifted prize money for Challenger events with $35,000 prize money to $40,000, and offered free hotels and physiotherapy for a number of tournaments with a prize money pot of $50,000. Pay for exiting in the early rounds of the sport’s four majors -- Wimbledon and the Australian, French and U.S. Opens -- has also risen in the past three years. More remains to be done, Kermode said.
The annual cost of playing pro tennis including travel with a coach was estimated at $143,000 in a 2010 study by the U.S. Tennis Association. It can take players three or four years to break into the top 100, if they manage to do so, while the average career on tour lasts seven years.
• Peter Bodo airs his grievances about the clay season in an entertaining read.
• Tennis players as South Park characters.
• Andy Roddick got an invite to the White House Correspondents' Dinner.
• In light of Adam Silver's strong presence this week for the NBA, Andy Murray called for a commissioner to bring harmony to tennis. It'll probably never happen, but it sure would be nice if it did.
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