March 15, 2009

11 US Players Including Jesse Levine & Jesse Witten in Draw

Sunrise, FL -- The BMW Tennis Championship has released the Qualifying Draw and  current world No. 26 Robin Soderling of Sweden will be the top seed in the tournament which starts on Monday at 10:00am at the Sunrise Tennis Club.

Soderling, who earned a career-best No. 15 ranking on February 2nd of this year, will be among 32 players battling for the four spots into the main draw.

"This is shaping up to arguably be our most competitive tournament yet," said Gabe Norona, tournament director.  "It makes a strong statement for our event when our qualifying includes a player with Soderling's ranking and our next three seeds are Top 100 ranked players with impressive credentials.  Tennis fans are definitely in for some great tennis this week."

The other top players Norona is talking about are No. 85 Bjorn Phau (GER), No. 87 Evgeny Korolev (RUS) and No. 100 Denis Gremelmayr (GER).

Korolev should be looking forward to returning to Florida where earlier this month he qualified at Delray Beach and advanced to his first ATP final losing to top seed Mardy Fish.   In January, the 21-year-old Russian earned international attention when he qualified for the Australian Open and then upset former No. 1 Carlos Moya in straight sets.  Unfortunately his run ended in the 2nd round when he drew another former No. 1, Roger Federer.

Gremelmayr, who has been ranked as high at No. 59,  had an impressive 2008 season that included wins over No. 8 James Blake and former No. 1 Marat Safin.  Phau' s resume also has an impressive list of wins over top ranked players Andre Agassi, Andrei Pavel and Thomas Enqvist.

The field will also have a strong US representation with 11 players in the draw. Floridians Jesse Levine from Boca Raton (FL) and Jesse Witten from Naples (FL) headline the group, which also includes teammates from Stanford University's 2000 national championship team, David Martin and Scott Lipsky.

If your looking to see the future of tennis on the court Monday, find 15-year-old Jeremy Efferding, who earned a wild card into the qualifying draw after winning the pre-qualifying tournament earlier this month.  Efferding from Lake Worth (FL) is part of the USTA National Junior team and trains at the USTA Training Complex in Boca Raton (FL) under the direction of Mark Merklein.  His first round opponent will be Soderling.

There is FREE ADMISSION to  watch the qualifying rounds.  Two rounds will be played on Monday and the final round will take place on Tuesday morning.

Tickets for the 2009 BMW Tennis Championship main draw are available for purchase online, by phone (Ph: 877.877.7677) and in-person at the Sunrise Tennis Club: 9605 West Oakland Park Blvd, Sunrise FL (Ph: 954.572-2286) and Pro Tennis World: 11306 State Road 84, Davie, FL (Ph: 954.474.1780).  Prices start at $10 for opening rounds.

A seven-year old hitting on center court just prior to the start of an exhibition match? That's what attracts both fans to the BMW Tennis Championship where world class tennis is played in an up close and personal setting.

The BMW Tennis Championship is in its sixth year as a key stop between two ATP World Tour Masters 1000 events (the BNP Paribas Open -- formerly the Pacific Life Open-and Sony Ericsson Open, played just 45 minutes short of Sunrise). The date of the BMW Tennis Championship enables the entry list to consistently host a field of top 50 players. Past participants have featured established and up-and-coming international players such as Todd Martin (USA), Gustavo Kuerten (Brazil), Sebastien Grosjean (France), Gael Monfils (France), Fernando Gonzales (Chile), Nicolas Massu (Chile), Guillermo Canas (Argentina), Juan Martin Del Potro (Argentina), Kei Nishikori (Japan), Thomas Enqvist (Sweden), Dominik Hrbaty (Slovakia) and Gilles Simon (France).