FREE US OPEN TENNIS Aug 20-23 New York’s Top Freebie: In case you didn’t know, and have time to take a break, get out to the US Open qualifying matches where the titans practice and future racket royalty is watchable in front of your nose or lens as you wander from court to court with those in the know about this great week of free top tennis, this time in perfect weather throughout!Power drive - Women's tennis today is not short of muscle: Live or TV? This week is the only good time to visit the US Open live. Not only is it free but you can actually see the best players close up practicing and the qualifiers struggling to make the opening round on the surrounding courts, which is a lot more interesting than watching them live at the bigger stadia, especially the cavernous Arthur Ashe, where watching a tennis match is like watching it in a dream, since the shots are whisper quiet even at court side, because the sound is muffled and absorbed by the distant seats ascending skywards. Compared with watching it on TV, about 1/5 of the excitement - a surreal and distant movie without a soundtrack, compared with an explosive upfront closeup gladiatorial wham bang confrontation complete with facial agonistes on the TV screen, especially on a 50in HD screen where one can actually see the ball, after years when it was mostly invisible on cathode ray tubes, beautiful though they were, at least in the Sony KV series. US Open Website US OPEN Web Site For Couch Potatoes: TV schedule: TV schedule (CBS and ESPN and Tennis Channel) Daily Schedule DAILY SCHEDULE Directions: How To Get There Take the 7 Local from Grand Central or Times Square, takes one hour. Subway: The 7 train provides easy service from Grand Central Terminal to Mets-Willets Point Station, the last or nearly the last before Flushing at the end of the 7 line, including connections for all Metro-North Trains from Westchester and Connecticut. Service is also available from the Port Authority Bus Terminal, by which they presumably mean Times Square. Also using LIRR at Penn Station at 34h St and 8th/9th according to a Web post: If you don't want to take the subway, you can also take the LIRR (Long Island Railroad) from Penn Station (8 blocks south of Times Square). The LIRR is a commuter rail train, about twice as expensive as the subway, but very comfy (cushioned seats) and the tennis stadium is only two stops (so it's quicker, less (sic, properly fewer) stops, etc). The stadium is also pretty much right next to the LIRR station, whereas the subway stop is only "close by"--about a 3-4 minute walk. What You Can't Bring: WHAT NOT TO BRING ONLY LIMITED QUANTITY FOOD, PLASTIC BOTTLES ONLY, ONE BAG, NO VIDEO CAMERAS, NO LAPTOPS, NO PENKNIVES, NO ALCHOHOL. US OPEN SECURITY PROCEDURES Safety ((and the revenue of our over priced shops, food stalls and restaurants)) is one of our highest priorities at the US Open, and we will continue to take every reasonable step to ensure the safety of everyone entering the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center gates. We will once again be implementing several important security measures in conjunction with local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies: 1. We encourage you to arrive early to avoid delays and help speed the entry of all spectators. 10 am opening day sessions and 6pm for evening sessions. 2. All fans will go through a screening process before passing through the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center entry gates. 3. There will be a limit of one bag per person admitted onto the grounds. 4. All bags are subject to search and cannot be larger than 12"W x 12"H x 16"L. 5. There will be no bag storage on the grounds. For a nominal charge, there is a bag storage facility outside the grounds. 6. Speed lines for those fans without bags will be available at all gates. 7. The following items are prohibited and MAY NOT be brought onto the premises: Backpacks Hard coolers or like containers Sealed packages of any kind Bottles or cans (glass or metal) WATER etc ONLY IN PLASTIC Aerosol cans or noisemaking devices Alcohol Video cameras or recording devices Computers or laptops Food (except in limited quantities, or for medical, dietary or infant purposes) Weapons Animals (unless a service animal) Flags, banners or signs Any materials constituting unauthorized advertising or promotion Laser pointing devices Tennis racquets Any other items deemed inappropriate or dangerous by the US Open personnel, in their sole discretion Grounds map Map =========================================================== How it turned out: Arrived late at 3pm Wed Aug 21 after an hour's trip from base camp on the Upper East Side and caught several matches in the second day of the first round of qualifiers, a couple of matches of both men and women. Struck by the muscularity and power of the women (see above) whose style is just as serious and businesslike as the men, even if they still can't quite manage equality in speed of stroke or moving around the court. The seats and stands were not as crowded as expected but there was still the pleasant sight of so many healthy tennis players young and old, including a colorfully dressed and sunburned older lady from Central Park. I was too busy testing the FZ30 on players to capture her on camera, which I regret. The FZ30 did surprisingly well, especially in focusing, even in automatic repeat. Chatted with Kai, a scientist and statistician for a very large pharma who hailed from China originally when he arrived thirty years ago, whose daughter Tiffany had her left arm in a bandaged cast from contracting tennis elbow for the second time at 16. Clearly superior in intelligence (she immediately admired the url of this site) Tiffany was practicing her SATs already and polishing her Mandarin, which although her parents spoke it a lot around the house she had never spoken much herself. I encouraged her to get a scholarship to Harvard or similar by adopting the Jonathan Franzen approach, which that distinguished writer says he adopted in winning a Fulbright. He tells the story in Harper's this month (p16). To win he claimed to want to go to Berlin to research expressionist theatrical production; his girlfriend at the time applied with thousands of others to go to Italy, and predictably got a rejection letter. The Jiang father and daughter said it was their one afternoon here, before going back to New Jersey where they live near Princeton. But they were satisfied - they had seen Federer practicing in the stadium - the top players tend to practice in the standium. Tiffany promised to let me know a Web site called "Humans of New York (http://www.humansofnewyork.com/) which features photos and sayings of people encountered on NYC streets. Kai promised to let me know about a paper writing by a Stanford professor which claims to prove mathematically most research paper results are incorrect. He said he didn't believe it was very useful because there was no way to know which were false.