Roland Garros = 4th Slam ?

If....

Paris >= Roland Garros and
Roland Garros = Square root of Event perimeter and
Area = Spectators times TV rights, is
Paris <= Roland Garros ?

Since they named him twice, once for the Tennis club where he attended religiously whilst on studies and the Airport because of his heroic flying skills, is the FO really historically embedded in Paris or is the event just a mere monument to Monsieur Garros?

If so, then there is no reason to stall moving the tournament to pastures new.

If not, then economically, it still makes bad sense to stay put.

And talking of history, all the other Slams moved for reasons of convenience and economic viability.

The US open moved from Newport Casino, Newport, Rhode Island to West Side Tennis Club at Forest Hills, New York in 1921, a short sprint to Germantown Cricket Club in Philadelphia for several years before making its home back in New York and rooting itself firmly in that awesome arena.

The Australian Open was even more nomadic. It began at Warehouseman's Cricket Ground, Melbourne in 1905, then it has been staged in five Australian and two New Zealand cities as follows: Melbourne (54 times), Sydney (17 times), Adelaide (14 times), Brisbane (7 times), Perth (3 times), Christchurch (in 1906), and Hastings (in 1912). In 1972 it finally ran out of steam and keeled over in Melbourne at the Kooyong Lawn Tennis Club. Owing to constraints of space and future development, Melbourne Park was built to house the AO in 1988 and has stayed there ever since.

Wimbledon by contrast has had the easiest of transitions, due to the fact that it had acres of green around it to expand. It did "move" a few yards from Worple road to Church street, but it is basically the same place. And they still have the option of securing the space next to them, occupied by the Wimbledon Park Golf Club (won't be an easy purchase for sure!), but there is still an area there if they absolutely need to expand.

Roland Garros does not have any options to expand the site in ground area, they are very close to utilising every square inch of space from the venue, the only way is to redevelop the event (there was talk of "sharing" itself with another venue close by). What this entails, as a new 5000 seater is planned, is moot, but to make one court bigger, surely some other courts must go or shrink? Not sure how they will do this, but the FFT has said that Roland Garros would have 60 per cent more space from 2015. Expansion will be costly, not as much as building on a new site, but it will cost nevertheless.

To me this is a bad decision, as it is almost like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. But the real proof will be in 20 years time, when the other 3 slams have again expanded and redeveloped and innovated, and the FO will just have to sit back and watch them from a distance. There is a big danger that they will become the 4th slam, maybe even the 5th slam as some Middle-eastern country with moola to spare will build an event bigger than the FO and attract the players and TV companies with more prestige and enigma.

The FO is not historically as strong as any of the other Slams and they need to rethink their strategies, sure there is history, I won't deny that, but every other slam has moved in relation to market pressures and economic sense. They may not have had the advantage of tradition from years of being in-situ, but they all recognised the need to uproot and migrate to pastures new.

IMO, humble as it is, the FO has strangled itself on its own umbilical cord, it may have staved off the hungry wolf that is progress, but the world will not stand still and wait for them to play catch up.

Poor Monsieur Garros, on wings of silk, flying through the clouds of expectation, looking down, he must be wondering what the raucous is all about. My name is just a name, wherever the event may be, it will still be called RG.

If they did move, it would give fresh impetus to moving the Paris Masters held at an old arena in Bercy and this week's Paris Open at Stade Coubertin into the hallowed ground.

It makes sense all around to move, but blind fingers clawing at tradition are suffocating the venue, lets hope they don't garotte the FO into extinction.

Jubbahey wrote:

It makes sense all around to move, but blind fingers clawing at tradition are suffocating the venue, lets hope they don't garotte the FO into extinction.

Yes....clinging to tradition is a major obstacle to progress.

I think they need to move forward or they're in danger of being left behind........I think that goes for most sporting events these days.

I'm afraid I don't know enough about tennis to comment any further.

I'm such a dummy when it comes to tennis that it used to take me a while to be able to immediately think which tournaments were the 4 Slams.

The AO, USO and Wimbledon would quickly come to mind but I'd be racking my brains before the FO popped into my head.

The FO is my least favourite Slam........says me with all my two years of following the sport lol.

Solerina

We've all got to start somewhere.

Basically, there are 250 point tournaments, called challengers, I think, followed by 500's and 1000's, the Masters are 1000 point tourneys, then you get the slams at 2500 points, but I'm a bit rusty on those figures, so hopefully someone will put me right if I am wrong. The only other event that attracts points for the ranking system is the WTF or World Tour finals at the end of the year. (2000 points ?)

So each player has to play a certain number of events in each category, not all of them, but they can choose which ones.

If they win an event, they get whatever points they earn, the next time they play that event they will defend their points, if they don't defend it, they lose the points and the ranking system mirrors that change.

If you win a couple of slams, that can give a player a cushion, so they can lose a few events other than slams and still keep their high rank.

Del Potro is a perfect example, out of the events for nearly a year, prob wont be able to defend any titles, so is slipping down the ranks rather quickly.

The point is that Slams attract more players because they bring in the most ranking points, but that in itself means they have to make sure they do well the next year they play it.

As far as the FO goes, they may be lucky enough to secure the FO as a Slam in the years ahead [EDIT( if it so happens that they begin to lose prestige)], but only if the powers that be decide that the game needs a 5th slam event. There are rumours that they are thinking that way, but only rumours as such, but it may mean they can stay at RG and still be a slam event in 25yrs time.

In the end, its all about bums on seats and TV rights.

Jubbahey wrote:

Basically, there are 250 point tournaments, called challengers, I think, followed by 500's and 1000's, the Masters are 1000 point tourneys, then you get the slams at 2500 points, but I'm a bit rusty on those figures, so hopefully someone will put me right if I am wrong. The only other event that attracts points for the ranking system is the WTF or World Tour finals at the end of the year. (2000 points ?)

Hi, Jubbahey!

You are a bit wrong...
ATP level tournaments: ATP 250, ATP 500 and ATP 1000 (Masters).
Slams are worth 2000 points, and the WTF 1500.

And the points for ATP Challenger Tournaments (lower level) range from 75 to 125.

Thanks Green, should have remembered the challengers are down there, Murray doesn't do them anymore

What are your thoughts on the FO staying put ?

Jubbahey wrote:
What are your thoughts on the FO staying put ?

(Haven't really thought much about it, but...) I say - move!


On a side note, you look very familiar, have we met before?

I was momentarily on MTL but mostly 606 until recently.

Something weird just happened on logging in to my 606 memberpage, it said "problem with page" bla bla, then it was OK. But I am now logged in as "Prambuster" !!!! even though its still my original page, but get this, its the BBC ID I have never been able to login to since last year.

I think someone has got in and changed the name.

Ruddy wums !!

Anyway, sorry for the next lame advert for a 606 article, but its managed to remain wum free for nearly a year and will have its 1st birthday on the 21st march.

Its usually off topic but sometimes gets tennis mentioned, but its fun.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/606/F16593347?thread=7383280

Don't worry about the deletions at the beginning, that was my experiment to see how many I could get away with. got sick of two posters (trolls) deleting me all the time. LOL But it will be sad to see it go when 606 goes hull up in a few months.

Hewwow Jubba

'Tis moi - God help you

yummymummy wrote:Hewwow Jubba

'Tis moi - God help you

Welcome to our lovely forum yummymummy......really great to see you here!

I'm sure Jubbahey will be thrilled to see you and some of the other 606ers over here!

Solerina

Fanks

I think this is going to be a great place to *live*

(IF I can ever work the blasted forum out)

yummymummy wrote:Fanks

I think this is going to be a great place to *live*

(IF I can ever work the blasted forum out)

Aaaw mummy......one of our best selling points here is the user friendliness of the forum.......I'm so sorry you're having trouble ........what seems to be the problem?

Solerina

Hi yummy, nice to see ya over here.

If you haven't already guessed, the Andymoaners thread is all on its own at the top of the tennis section, with a heading all of its own inside, just two clicks away. (my mouse doesn't click anymore, more like "thribbits" when I press it).

*thribbits* is a NEW WORD to me !!!


It sounds slightly old-fashioned - as in I love him to *thribbits*

I.m orf to bed now and taking my laryngitis wiv me !!




Night Nght <hug> <hug>

I thought Thribbit was the sound a frog made, which kind of illustrates the direction my mouse is going....croaked!

Is it very "quiet" round your house tonight ?

Oh, by the way Solerina, I love the "online" tag next to a post, its really helpful to know if a poster is there or not.

Jubbahey wrote:

Oh, by the way Solerina, I love the "online" tag next to a post, its really helpful to know if a poster is there or not.

Yes it is.........I see you're not here anymore lol

Solerina

Back again!!

Meanwhile back at the ranch..........

I have a nasty feeling this was a "really" bad decision by the FFT!, a few weeks on and it still doesn't look to me like a good idea.

I think there was a lot of enthusiasm and optimism with the bids coming in for the alternative grounds from the public and the players as well as the event organisers, i can't imagine that they actually wanted to stay at RG, knowing as they do that the site can only be developed upwards if they want to expand it any further in the future.

They should have gone this year and laid the foundations for a bigger and better French open with room to spare and left the original space to be filled with the satellite events.

If they thought there was not enough money, they could have done it in 10 yrs time, saved up a bit, got some big sponsors interested in the meantime and it would have been done and dusted. Now they are going to spend millions of francs on what I believe will be a black sheep dressed up as a white elephant.

Any kind of refurb or restructure in the near future is out of the question now they are committed to spending all the proceeds on redevelopment.

Foot - shot - mouth - jump - feet

Fire Branding Ouch etc.


Who knows the ins and outs of the French mind?

Anyone????

Jubbahey wrote:Back again!!

Meanwhile back at the ranch..........

I have a nasty feeling this was a "really" bad decision by the FFT!, a few weeks on and it still doesn't look to me like a good idea.

I think there was a lot of enthusiasm and optimism with the bids coming in for the alternative grounds from the public and the players as well as the event organisers, i can't imagine that they actually wanted to stay at RG, knowing as they do that the site can only be developed upwards if they want to expand it any further in the future.

They should have gone this year and laid the foundations for a bigger and better French open with room to spare and left the original space to be filled with the satellite events.

If they thought there was not enough money, they could have done it in 10 yrs time, saved up a bit, got some big sponsors interested in the meantime and it would have been done and dusted. Now they are going to spend millions of francs on what I believe will be a black sheep dressed up as a white elephant.

Any kind of refurb or restructure in the near future is out of the question now they are committed to spending all the proceeds on redevelopment.

Foot - shot - mouth - jump - feet

Jubbahey......I only know what you've posted on here about all this.........but I agree with you.

Solerina

Well Solerina, I am not quite sure how they are going to do this...

http://www.atpworldtour.com/News/Tennis/2011/02/Other/Roland-Garros-Keeps-French-Open.aspx

So they are going from 8.5 hectares, (around 800m by 800m) to 1300m2.

That over 50% increase in floor space.

Either they had land in reserve or are going to share the venue with courts close by.

The cost to stay is half that to move and the FO at the moment brings in 250 million euros, strangely close to the cost of the redevelopment.

If they can contain 35 acres at the original site it will be as big as the US open and 15 acres smaller than Wimbledon and the Oz open.

It remains to be seen how this extension is going to be able to fit in with the original area of 8.5 ha...

http://2009.rolandgarros.com/en_FR/about/Venue_Map_with_streets_e.pdf

The surrounding land is all developed, with only greenery to the north of the venue across the busy 8 lane E05. I can only imagine that they are going to redevelop adjoining land as well, but how many times can they do this ?

Look here, click satellite view and see for yourself how contained RG is within the confines of a city space.

http://www.afranceattraction.com/france-attractions-mp/map/roland-garros.htm

Jubbahey wrote:

Look here, click satellite view and see for yourself how contained RG is within the confines of a city space.

http://www.afranceattraction.com/france-attractions-mp/map/roland-garros.htm

Crumbs! How can they expand if they stay there? ( I could waste hours looking at these maps lol)

Some strange decisions going on here by the sound of things.

It's all a bit beyond me, Jubbahey, I'm off to visit your Limerick thread........which is proving to be very popular

Solerina

I must say I'm rather ignorant on this subject as I've not read into the detail of it, nor have I been to Roland Garros, so I don't know that I'm qualified to comment.

I just have this silly pull about tradition, and history, and maintaining all that sort of thing. I know things change and life moves on and all that, but I suppose I'd always opt to see if a solution could be found on the existing site.

And what's this about limericks?? ...............

This is the limerick article wooffie (in our off topic section)
https://www.606v2.com/t1452-the-make-your-own-limerick-up-thread

Enjoy

Yes ... very good. <applause>

We've made up some great limericks about Rafa in the past which have had us in <hoots>

Off topic ...