2011 WTA Tour Awards

Today was all about the ladies or at least that's what it felt like today. First there was the seemingly simultaneous release of the trailers for The Iron Lady and The Hunger Games which had the web buzzing. No long-winded comment on either one, but I loved seeing Anthony Stewart Head in the former and I got goosebumps (and tears started welling up) when I saw the latter.

But there was also the announcement of the WTA Tour Awards which signals the official end of the year. Other than my brief post on Roger Federer's 800th win a couple of days ago, I haven't talked about tennis in almost two months so I'd like to take this opportunity to see how the women's tour ended their year.


It's actually not that hard since all we have to really talk about is Petra Kvitova. She won Player of the Year and for good reason. Finishing the year at a career-high ranking of #2, she capped off her great year by demolishing the field at the year-end tournament and then led her Czech team to win Fed Cup. She also won tournaments in the first half as well as the second half, including her first Grand Slam at Wimbledon. She won three other year-end awards including Most Improved Player, Fan Favorite Breakthrough Player, and the Karen Krantzcke Sportsmanship Award.

The other player to have noteworthy post-US Open results was Agnieszka Radwanksa winning the Toray Pan Pacific Open and China Open securing the last spot at the year-end WTA Championships. She was honored as the Fan Favorite Singles Player. Victoria Azarenka & Maria Kirilenko took the Fan Favorite Doubles Team.

Other players honored with WTA Tour Awards include Sabine Lisicki for Comeback Player of the Year, Irina-Camelia Begu for Newcomer of the Year, Kveta Peschke and Katarina Srebotnik for Doubles Team of the Year, and Francesca Schiavone for the Player Service Award. It is also worth noting that while not part of the awards, Caroline Wozniacki ended the year at #1 for two years in a row.