Rafael Nadal News

A victory in Vienna moved Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to a No. 7 world ranking and to seventh in the race for one of eight invitations to the ATP World Tour Finals.

Only four tournaments remain in 2011 and all are huge. Preceding the Paris Masters and the World Tour Finals in London are Basel and Valencia, which wrap up the 500-point season this week.

Pippa Middleton is apparently in talks with literary agent David Godwin regarding a book deal.

Novak Djokovic became the main story of the year by blowing away everyone he faced.

Tennis great Bill Tilden once described how tennis transcended sporting realms and went into the art world.

ITV has snatched TV rights to the French Open, won this year by Rafael Nadal, from the BBC.

With Maria Sharapova and Victoria Azarenka both present in Istanbul, the first two days of the WTA championships have unsurprisingly been ripe with discussion on the subject of grunting.

Andy Murray will join world No 1 Novak Djokovic and home hero Roger Federer at the ATP World Tour event in Basle next week.

Rafael Nadal’s bulging biceps and strong legs make him an exceptionally explosive player, but players must use their entire body to generate velocity when making contact with the ball.

Kia Motors has a new commercial out with Rafael Nadal. During the short ad, Nadal reveals what he likes, facebook-style. Nadal is currently enjoying a few weeks of rest before returning next month on November 7 for the Paris Masters, London and then the Davis Cup finals in Spain against Argentina.

There are seven billion people on this little blue planet, and how many of them — how many of us — will ever do something truly exceptional? Winning one of tennis’ four annual Grand Slam events counts as such an achievement, at least in my book.

The poor organization at the U.S. Open was the end of the line for many of the top players.

I just read the mailbag that included a question from Phil of Philadelphia about players from a Slam’s host nation being unable to win their home Slam.

Giving out abuse and getting physical with officials, fellow players and even getting nasty with the crowd, these really are the 13 moments where tennis players turned nasty on the court.

Rafael Nadal is the best player in tennis, and at only 25, he is set to dominate for a few years longer.