The USTA has announced the field for the 2015 US Open Wheelchair Competition. The event, in its ninth year, will be held Sept. 10-13, at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, N.Y.
The 2015 US Open Wheelchair Competition will feature a Men’s, Women’s and Quad Division, and will include six events: men’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s singles, women’s doubles, quad singles and quad doubles. Wheelchair tennis follows the same rules as able-bodied tennis, except that the ball can bounce twice.
This year’s field will feature 17 of the top 20 wheelchair tennis athletes from around the globe, including the top seven men, top seven women and top three quads. One wild card also will be awarded for each event. Players were selected based on their ITF rankings as of July 27. The total purse for the event will be $180,000.
MEN RANKING
Shingo Kunieda (JPN) 1
Stéphane Houdet (FRA) 2
Nicolas Peifer (FRA) 3
Joachim Gerard (BEL) 4
Gordon Reid (GBR) 5
Gustavo Fernandez (ARG) 6
Maikel Scheffers (NED) 7
Michaël Jérémiasz (FRA) 12 (WC)
WOMEN RANKING
Jiske Griffioen (NED) 1
Aniek van Koot (NED) 2
Yui Kamiji (JPN) 3
Sabine Ellerbrock (GER) 4
Jordanne Whiley (GBR) 5
Marjolein Buis (NED) 6
Lucy Shuker (GBR) 7
Kaitlyn Verfuerth (USA) 18 (WC)
QUAD RANKING
David Wagner (USA) 1
Dylan Alcott (AUS) 2
Andy Lapthorne (GBR) 3
Nick Taylor (USA) 17 (WC)
In the women’s field, top seed Jiske Griffioen, 30, of the Netherlands, will look to claim her first US Open Wheelchair Competition title after becoming the No. 1 player in the world in June for the first time in her career. Defending singles and doubles champion Yui Kamiji, 21, of Japan, will look to win her second consecutive title at the event. Competing for the first time since 2006 in the field will be 29-year-old American Kaitlyn Verfuerth.
On the men’s side, world No. 1 Shingo Kunieda, 31, also of Japan, will look to win his sixth US Open Wheelchair Competition singles title since 2007. Up and comer Gustavo Fernandez, 21, of Argentina, will be looking to win the title after losing to Kuneida in the final last year.
The United States will be represented by the three-time Paralympic Quad doubles gold medalists David Wagner (Chula Vista, Calif.) and Nick Taylor (Wichita, Kan.) in the quad singles and doubles division. Wagner will be looking to win his third US Open Wheelchair Competition quad singles title, last winning in 2011 and losing to Great Britain’s Andrew Lapthorne in the 2014 final. In doubles, Wagner and Taylor will look to continue their dominance in the event by putting their names on the trophy for a seventh time. They are the only team ever to win the Quad doubles title.
The USTA was officially designated by the USOC as the national governing body for the Paralympic sport of wheelchair tennis in June 2002, becoming the first Olympic national governing body to earn this recognition. As the national governing body for wheelchair tennis, the USTA manages wheelchair tennis in the United States, including the development of local programming, the sanctioning of tournaments, overseeing wheelchair rankings, creating and managing a High Performance program for developing elite disabled athletes, and selecting teams to compete internationally for the United States.
The USTA is the national governing body for the sport of tennis in the U.S. and the leader in promoting and developing the growth of tennis at every level – from local communities to the highest level of the professional game. A not-for-profit organization with more than 715,000 members, it invests 100% of its proceeds in growing the game. It owns and operates the US Open, the highest-attended annual sporting event in the world, and launched the Emirates Airline US Open Series, linking seven summer tournaments to the US Open. In addition, it owns approximately 90 Pro Circuit events throughout the U.S. and selects the teams for the Davis Cup, Fed Cup, Olympic and Paralympic Games. The USTA’s philanthropic entity, the USTA Foundation, provides grants and scholarships and helps under-resourced youth and individuals with disabilities, and supports wounded, ill and injured service members, veterans and their families. For more information on the USTA, log on to usta.com, “like” the official Facebook page, facebook.com/usta, or follow @usta on Twitter.
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