Since Steffi and the family are going to be snow boarding during the winter and tennis season coming to an end after at Men's WTF event in London, expecting a relatively quite year end with regards to news coverage but busy from a house wife stand point with Thanks Giving and Christmas holiday preparations on the way. And its good to be busy.
Steffi couldn't attend Chris Evert's charity this year as announced but stll is contributing to the charity. A one hr tennis lesson with Steffi Graf being auctioned for Chris Evert's charity.
http://www.charitybuzz.com/auctions/chrisevert/catalog_items/289405
What can a boxing legend learn from a tennis legend??
http://beyondtheclassroomjtfs.blogspot.com/2011/11/what-manny-pacquiao-can-learn-from.html
Wouldn't mention Steffi's and Serena's endorsements as the same as this headline seems to suggest. 'Sensuous' is a milder term to descirbe Serena's add for topspin which never made it to the market (never intended to make it to the market if you beleive the 'marketers', why make it then!!!!).
http://tennis.com/articles/templates/thespin.aspx?articleid=15113&zoneid=32
Steffi walking the runway makes it to 'Memory Lane' feature on SI.
So fearless, free and a 'ballerina' on the tennis court yet so shy and reserved off the court and on the runway as well. Seems like the models were making sure that she does not run away from the 'runway'. You know when someone has the timing of an olympic runner/winner and most of her matches are done in 40-45 minutes, hard to blame the models as left alone on her own, she would have appeared/disappeared from the stage in seconds.
http://tennis.si.com/2011/11/16/memory-lane-steffi-works-the-runway/
And on that topic, time to revisit this old piece from NYT when Steffi completed the GS in 1988, the youngest of any male or female players to win a calendar year GS and if I am not wrong, this is just in the 'open' era (yes!!! and since it is Steffi Graf, it is taken for granted like many of her accomplishments and no one even bothers to mention that). Maureen Connolly is the youngest to win the calendar year GS in 1953, she was 3 months younger to Steffi when she did it (I was wrong and so edited my earlier statement above).
Loved the last few sentences of the article including the 'kid in denim shorts' reference:
"The Open showed that the tennis season is already too long, and there are still three months to play. If not for Graf and the kid in blue denim shorts, the Open would have been a disappointment.
Given the length of the season, injury and fatigue factors, and the luck that is needed to survive, Graf's Grand Slam is even more noteworthy. So she did not hop over the net in jubilation. Years from now, there will be at least 100,000 people who will claim to have been in that 20,000-seat stadium on Saturday. And they will say that Steffi had a tear in her eye".
http://www.nytimes.com/1988/09/13/sports/sports-of-the-times-graf-s-misleading-reaction.html?src=pm
Another nice piece written in 99 just before Steffi's retirement from the sport. Again, have my own views and might not agree with everything said but liked the ending.
"Since adolescence, her entire life - from her teenage menstrual cycle, charted in a German magazine, to her father's affairs - has been exposed to public scrutiny. Yet the only place she can find some peace is in front of packed grandstands and squadrons of photographers. This, sometimes, is the condition of the modern sports celebrity. How little we really know her. And oh, how we'll miss her when she's gone".
How we miss her on the court!!! Have to echo what many others have said many times in the past:
"Where are you Steffi Graf?"
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/profile-steffi-graf--steffi-1100868.html
Happy Thanksgiving and the next post will be a biweekly musing in view of the holiday weekend.
