Olympic Green Tennis Center

The Olympic Green Tennis Center or Beijing Olympic Green Tennis Court (北京奥林匹克公园网球场), [ Beijing Olympics site, [http://en.beijing2008.cn/venues/ogt/index.shtml Beijing Olympic Green Tennis Court] ] is a tennis centre located in the Olympic Green. It opened on 1 October 2007 [http://miaobaby.com/olympics/olympic-green-tennis-center-is-officially-delivered-on-national-day/] . It hosted the Tennis preliminaries and finals of singles and doubles for men and women at the Beijing 2008 Olympics (See Tennis at the 2008 Summer Olympics) as well as the Paralympic Wheelchair Tennis competitions (See Wheelchair Tennis at the 2008 Summer Paralympics)

General Information

The Center is located in Beijing, just 1.7 miles from the Beijing National Stadium aka. The Birds Nest Stadium.

The tennis centre covers an area of 41.22 acres or 16.68 hectares with a floor space of 285,394 square feet or 26,514 square meters. According to the requirements of the Olympic Games, the centre will have 10 competition courts and 6 training courts, with a capacity of 17,400 seats.

The main courts: Center court, Court one & Court two each represent a lotus flower, one of the emblems of the Beijing Olympics Each have 12 stands, each one representing a petal of the lotus flower. Center court has a capacity of 10,000, Court one: 4,000 and Court two: 2,000. The courts have been specially designed for natural air ventilation to reduce the amount of air pollution entering the courts, ensuring optimal health for both athletes and spectators. It also allows the courts to be cooled and with an installation of cooling machines, the courts' temperatures can easily be reduced to five degrees Celsius. Curtains attatched to the roofs of the courts also allows them to be cooled in the heat of the sun.

The project embodies the concepts of Green Olympics, Hi-Tech Olympics, and People's Olympics. It integrates design experience of world sport architecture and will be a tennis competition venue of the state of the art design in keeping with international standards.

Timeline

Before The Olympics

The courts were opened on 1 October 2007 and were tested between 6 October and 20 October 2007 in the [http://www.tennis2007.org/en/ Good Luck Beijing 2007 ITF Pro Circuit] , where 36 men and 44 women competed.

During The Olympics

The Courts hosted the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. The following competitions were played:
Men's Singles - 64-Player Draw
Women's Singles - 64-Player Draw
Men's Doubles - 32-Player Draw
Women's Doubles - 32-Player Draw

The Winners

During The Paralympics

The Courts also hosted the Wheelchair Tennis competitions of the 2008 Summer Paralympics in Beijing. These were played between 8 September and 15 September 2008.

112 athletes (approximately 64-80 male and 32~48 female) were classified into disability group.

The competitions played included:
*Men's singles
*Women's singles
*Men's doubles
*Women's doubles
*Quads singles
*Quads doubles

The Winners

After The Olympics/Paralympics

After the Beijing Olympic and Paralympic games of 2008, the center will remain standing and become the new home of the Chinese Tennis Association. It has not hosted the 2008 China Open Tennis tournament, despite rumours it would. Rumours, however are circulating that it will host next year's tournament

External links

[http://en.beijing2008.cn/venues/ogt/ Beijing Olympic Green Tennis Center venue site]