Indian Wells

The grand slams host the biggest viewing audiences for any tennis related event in the world. Outside these tournaments, the next best thing to a grand slam tournament like the U.S. Open is Indian Wells which commenced today. The picture on the right is of the Indian Wells Tennis Garden located in the Coachella Valley of southern California. The stadium can hold over 16,000 fans, and boasts its world class tennis facility. However, this second largest tennis stadium in the world isn’t the reason for the players to gather here every year. The prize pool alone totals $4.5 million and the tournament represents 1/16th of the points that can be accumulated in a year.
Despite the crucial points that can be earned towards rankings, two American’s are missing out on the tournament and will probably never travel to Indian Wells again. Serena and Venus Williams, currently ranked number 1 and number 5 in the world respectively, did not even enter. This is because in 2001 when Venus was supposed to battle Serena in the semi-finals she defaulted blaming it on tendinitis. At the time, the public did not believe such an excuse and racist remarks were yelled out in the finals towards the innocent Serena. This was even hard to believe but was blamed on the town of Indian Wells which is 96.33% white (2000 census) and has the highest proportion of millionaires of any city in America. Hard to believe such a thing would happen, but the sisters have not returned since.