❧❧❧ Whatever you can do or dream, you can BEGIN IT. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Goethe ❧❧❧
❧❧❧ You were born whole, not broken. Sandra Hammel ❧❧❧
Rafa won his round 2 match against Juan Ignacio Chela
6-2, 6-3.
I don't have time to post today, but here is tomorrow's schedule in Monte Carlo.
Rafa plays third again on Court Central. So figure an hour or an hour and a half for each of the preceding matches and then it will be Rafa and Lapentti. Remember the USA EST/DST is 6 hours behind. So the first match starts at 4:30 a.m. USA east coast time.
COURT CENTRAL start 10:30 am [7] F Verdasco (ESP) vs [10] D Ferrer (ESP) [13] S Wawrinka (SUI) vs [2] [WC] R Federer (SUI) [1] R Nadal (ESP) vs [Q] N Lapentti (ECU) [4] A Murray (GBR) vs [Q] F Fognini (ITA) M Cilic (CRO) / N Kiefer (GER) vs [2] D Nestor (CAN) / N Zimonjic (SRB)
COURT DES PRINCES start 10:30 am [Q] A Beck (GER) vs J Monaco (ARG) A Montanes (ESP) vs [3] N Djokovic (SRB) S Bolelli (ITA) vs [WC] I Ljubicic (CRO) [12] D Nalbandian (ARG) vs [8] N Davydenko (RUS)
COURT 2 start 1:30 pm F Lopez (ESP) / F Verdasco (ESP) vs [4] M Bhupathi (IND) / M Knowles (BAH)
Elie Wiesel "...to remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all... Wiesel is the author of 36 works dealing with Judaism, the Holocaust, and the moral responsibility of all people to fight hatred, racism and genocide. Source: ELIE BIO
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The above pictures of Rafael Nadal are from the Semi-Final match in Cincinnati August 2, 2008. Novak Djokovic won 6-1, 7-5. The pictures are from Daylife, but sometimes Daylife pictures are really from Getty. Just hard to know who to give credit, although I try.
Rafa had played in the final match of 8 of the last 10 matches he played in. He won 7 of those final matches, including Monte Carlo, Barcelona, Hamburg, Roland Garros, Queens Club, Wimbledon, Toronto. All three surfaces: clay, grass and hard. He lost in Miami.
Rafa was tired, very tired in Cincinnati. He played more tennis than any other competitor because he won the most matches.
Now, he is in Beijing, to play for his country of Spain.
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............................................ Uploaded by niinzniinz Rafael Nadal and Tommy Robredo arrive in Beijing ............................................
............................................ Uploaded by luneworld Rafael Nadal and Uncle Tony in Beijing Uncle Tony interviewed and playing pool with Rafa
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............................................ Uploaded by luneworld Rafa interviewed
When TV doesn't air tennis matches, or the streaming stalls or completely doesn't work - and the "paid for" sites are the most unreliable - youtube is the place to see the sport of tennis. And customer service on ATP's live streaming site is not that helpful to the individual. Recently so many fan-uploaded tennis matches or parts of matches have been removed from Youtube. My personal opinion is that this hurts tennis. The money that the tennis copyright holders are trying to save for themselves to make surely isn't diminished by uploading tennis to Youtube or other similar sites. We want to see it live, but failing that, Youtube tennis viewing promotes the sport, peaks and nurtures interests and only helps those who want more people to tune into tennis so that they can make money.
Youtube in effect is free advertising for the corporate tennis administrations. But they delete the tennis youtube videos continually thinking they are protecting their money-making ventures. Roland Garros deleted videos continually during the French Open.
Rethinking their philosophy and method to make money and allowing videos to be put on Youtube and Daily Motion should be allowed so that more people are brought into the viewing tennis population.
I actually have bought the passes to ATP (which most of the time doesn't work) and Wimbledon. Wimbledon by far is the better. I couldn't get the live matches (probably because of too much "traffice"), but the downloads of entires matches are fantastic. The ATP was having technical difficulty at the Toronto final last Sunday, so the entire match was unavailable. And ESPN was knocked out by a thunderstorm in my area.
ATP doesn't upload entire matches of the current tournaments, just selected matches of the past. And of those, I have always had difficulty getting these matches to play all the way to the end.
Yesterday, I was so surprised to be able to view the entire match on the ATP site of Rafael Nadal v Nicolas Lapentti. This only proves it is not my computer. It probably means that since the match was televised the traffic on the ATP site was so much less and I was able to to have success. ATP is better than TV in that the change overs are shown and there are no commercial breaks.
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................................................ Rafael Nadal beat Nicolas Lapentti in Cincinnati August 1, 2008 7-6(3), 6-1 and secures the number 1 position. Uploaded by tennis24gr
Who has won on clay, grass and hard court and just became Number One?
Rafael Nadal
Most recently in 2008 Rafa won Toronto, Wimbledon, Queens Club, French Open - Roland Garros, Barcelona, Monte Carlo, Hamburg
Nicolas Lapentti lost the Quarter Final match to Rafael Nadal August 1, 2008 7-6 (3), 6-1
Lapentti played magnificently until Rafa won the tie break, then Rafa took on unbeatable proportions.
Congratulations to Rafa for becoming Number One tonight.
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................................................ Quarter Final Spainard Rafael Nadal defeats Ecuadorian Nicolas Lapentti 7-6(3), 6-1 August 1, 2008 in Cincinnati (Mason), Ohio
Rafael Nadal NUMBER ONE by way of points accumulated
Rafa's next opponent in Cincinnati Novak Djokovic August 2, 2008 at 7:00 p.m.
VAMOS CAMPEON - RAFA!
Photo credits: Ronald Martinez/Getty Images North America except the one at the top, which is a Sports Illustrated photo
Rafael Nadal will replace Roger Federer at the top of the world rankings this month after the second-seeded Spaniard moved past Nicolas Lapentti 7-6 (7/3) 6-1 in the quarter-finals of the Western & Southern Financial Group Masters on Friday.
Nadal has won his last five tournaments and if the 22-year manages to claim the championship at this hardcourt event, he will overtake Roger Federer as the number one player in the world.
The top-ranked player for a record 235 weeks, Federer had the opportunity to keep Nadal at bay a bit longer had he reached the semi-finals here, but a third-round loss to Ivo Karlovic on Thursday ended that possibility. By reaching the semi-finals, Nadal will become number one on August 18 and he is guaranteed to move atop the rankings on August 11 by finishing as the runner-up.
Nadal, who is an ATP-best 64-7 this season and is riding a 32-match win streak, connected on 67 percent of his first serves and saved all three break points. He had two break opportunities and capitalised on both. Nadal will meet third-seeded Novak Djokovic in a semi-final clash. Djokovic downed Latvia's Ernests Gulbis 6-3 6-4, in the quarters.
"I thought that I was serving much better, and day after day I'm getting stronger in the segment of my game, which is really important coming up to the final stages of the tournament," said Djokovic, who improved to 43-10 on the season, 22-5 on hard courts.
Djokovic won his first Grand Slam title earlier this year at the Australian Open and appeared destined to challenge Federer and Nadal atop the rankings, but his season has taken a downturn after a disappointing second-round exit at Wimbledon and a quarter-final loss to Andy Murray in Toronto last week. The 21-year-old Serb is likely excited about facing Nadal on a hard court. A win would exact a small measure of revenge for Djokovic, who twice failed to beat Nadal on clay this spring with the number two ranking hanging in the balance.
On the opposite side of the draw, Karlovic built on his win over Federer when he upended unseeded German Philipp Kohlschreiber 7-6 (8/6) 7-6 (7/3) in a quarter-final. The hard-serving Croat - who leads the ATP with 657 aces this year - came into this tournament on a three-match losing streak, but has regained the form that led him to a title at Nottingham earlier this year.
Karlovic will face the eighth-seeded Andy Murray, who overcame a slow start to post a 2-6 6-2 6-1 win over veteran Spaniard Carlos Moya, the 2002 champion.
Murray looked uninspired in losing the first set to the 31-year-old and was broken in the first game of the second. From that point, however, he won 12 of the last 15 games and looked more like the player who recently reached the semi-finals at Wimbledon and Toronto.
"I mean, to go two breaks down, a set and two breaks down, would have been tough to come back from," Murray said. "But, you know, it happens sometimes in tennis when you're feeling confident and you know your opponent hasn't maybe played as well as he can throughout the year."
I watched the match on ESPN2 and also on the ATP website when TV went to commercials or when I wanted to see something again. TV is always ahead of the ATP streaming by a couple points it seems. Well, Rafa WON! He is number 1! What a night in Cincinnati for Rafa. It happened on hard court and it happened in the USA. How Special is that - that where before he has not found such Rafa-success, he showed the USA and the World that he has arrived! Nicolas Lapentti gave Rafa a great match to become number 1. Rafa had to earn it. The ESPN commentators thought Rafas nerves were affecting his play. I don't know. Lapentti was fantastic! Rafa did seem to bring more magic from Set 1's tie break on. Some of his points were so Rafa-like! But Lapentti had some magical points too.
So wonderful for Rafa!
So wonderful for us as his loyal and loving fans to be a part of This Special Moment.
So happy for Rafa and Uncle Tony. So special Rafa's dear people get to share it with Rafa.
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........................................... Uploaded by Juliette2007September 16, 2007 "A New Day" Seems such an appropriate song for today
I love my life. I love where I live. And I am passionate about my passions. I love to dance. Necessary to live: music, piano, singing, writing, acting, painting.
I have been fighting for and supporting the arts all my adult life. Since 2004, I have been working with other activists to end the Darfur genocide.
I have traveled to Europe many times since my early twenties. Places I have been: many USA states including Hawaii, Montreal, Canada, Barbados, France, Spain, Luxembourg, England, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Greece and Germany - and have wonderful memories.
My last trip was in May - June 2013 to Spain.
I would like to travel to Europe and Kyoto, Japan.
I love the southwest where I have visited Hopi, Navajo, Zia and San Idlefonso potters.
Life is exciting and I intend to live it full-out to the end.
B.S. and M.M., both in music
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Khartoum, Sudan Stop Genocide Time
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Spain Time
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Melbourne Time
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Hawaii Time
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RAFA NADAL -BRING BACK LONG PANTS - SLEEVELESS TOPS
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Genocide is not only a word,
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The honor and integrity of the human race is at stake.
Rafa won his round 2 match against Juan Ignacio Chela
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