Off season chillin’. The WTA ladies are already deep into rest and relaxation mode. The paparazzi caught Caroline Wozniaki sunbathing topless in a cute bikini while vacationing on the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius last week. Agnieszka Radwanska and Urszula Radwanska came along for the trip.

“I am very pleased to have a holiday and relax. I feel I really have given everything this year, so I deserve it,” Caroline said in Doha before jetting off for 10 days in paradise. This is reportedly her first vacation unaccompanied by her parents – make the most of it, Caroline!

Photos via Sports by Brooks via: Ekstra Bladet and Forty Deuce

If you’re curious as to who Robin Soderling’s girlfriend is, well her she is. Jenni Mostrom. Don’t know too much information about her, but apparently she has a swedish blog you can follow.
http://www.bloglovin.com/en/blog/536657/rss—advantage-jenni-med-jenni-mostr

 

Photo: JP/Ricky Yudhistira

The WTA’s final tournament of the year is this week in Bali at the Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions. The $600,000 tournament is a kind of consolation year ending championships, open to the top players who have won at least one International Series level event in 2009 and who didn’t make Doha. Sabine Lisicki and Kimiko Date Krumm accepted the tournament’s two wildcards, completing the 12 woman draw. Click here for more info.

Marion Bartoli, Sam Stosur, Yanina Wickmayer and Sabine Lisicki are the top seeds and head up the four round robin groups:

Group A: Marion Bartoli, Shahar Peer, Magdalena Rybarikova
Group B: Samantha Stosur, Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez, Agnes Szavay
Group C: Yanina Wickmayer, Anabel Medina Garrigues, Kimiko Date Krumm
Group D: Sabine Lisicki, Melinda Czink, Aravane Rezai

The tournament put a tropical spin on the requisite “evening gown” competition, hosting a welcome lunch and dressing the players in bright finery by Balinese designer Rico Anantha. I want one! (A dress, not a player – though I’d take Lisicki’s serve and Peer’s backhand.)

Photos via the WTA website – click here for more.

Aravane Rezai and Yanina Wickmayer:

Kimiko Date Krumm and Shahar Peer:

Marion Bartoli and Sabine Lisicki

Magdalena Rybarikova and Anabel Medina Garrigues:

Agnes Szavay and Melinda Czink:

The ladies also took part in some kind of skin care demonstration, which I would find horribly condescending if it didn’t look like so much fun! (Also, I labeled this post “Tennis Babes” so who am I to talk?)

So is this a tournament or the off-season?

Serena and Venus Williams, Dinara Safina and the rest of the WTA’s top eight gathered at the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, Qatar on Sunday to take part in the Sony Ericsson Year End Championships draw ceremony. Here’s the lowdown on the draw via tennis.com:

WHITE GROUP:

• Dinara Safina
• Caroline Wozniacki
• Victoria Azarenka
• Jelena Jankovic

MAROON GROUP:

• Serena Williams
• Svetlana Kuznetsova
• Elena Dementieva
• Venus Williams

The top two finishers in each round robin group advance to the semifinals, where each first-placed player will face the second-placed player from the other group. (Meaning that Venus and Serena could meet in the final, even though they’re in the same group.)

Of course, no WTA event would be complete without the ballgown competition.

As usual, J.J.’s the one to beat:

Elena Dementieva’s wax figure:

I don’t know who this is:

Caroline Wozniacki was sweeping a chimney before this was taken:

Kuzy has a new sponsorship with David’s Bridal:

Serena channels Chaka Kahn.

Vika rocks her prom:

And Venus defies explanation:

The Championships start on Tuesday. Click here to visit the WTA’s Doha website.

Yay! The moment we’ve all been waiting for! Serena Williams naked on the cover of ESPN The Magazine’s “The Body Issue”! She is one of six cover models, click here to check out a few others.

Image via HCFoo’s Tennis Blog

Not enough nudity for you? Click here to check out the GTT ’s Body Issue and here for more of Serena.

Would my photo service lie to me? Honestly, I don’t know. But photos of someone it’s calling Juan Martin del Potro’s girlfriend have just popped up, along with this caption:

“Tennis player Juan Martin del Potro’s girlfriend Yanina Screpante. Yanina is on the cover of most Argentine newspaper reports as the local model who has been dating del Potro for the last two months. Juan Martin del Potro recently won the 2009 Tennis US Open.”

From what I gleaned browsing a few websites (here, here and here), Yanina Screpante is 25 years old. She met del Potro for the first time about a year ago in a Buenos Aires nightclub, but they’ve only been dating semi-seriously for the past few months.  Given the brief nature of their (alleged) relationship, the two are trying to keep a low profile and have yet to be photographed together by the media. Good luck with that, kids!

All I can say is that she certainly looks like someone who would date an Argentine tennis player!

My apologies to my serious-minded readers. I don’t know if it’s LA’s crazy Santa Ana winds or just this lull in the season, but I’m in a tabloidy mood, lately!

Big thanks to Miri at Nadal News for posting this big juicy hunk of Rafael Nadal. I guess he’s promoting some kind of hoodie with a name that sounds like a model of airplane or a wingnut. Whatever, me likey!

Don’t worry, guys, I found some Maria Sharapova for you.

Enjoy!

Our last day in NYC was fairly productive – with the highlight being a three set match between Azarenka and Schiavone. Victoria joins the crew of top 20 seeds who have been booted out of the singles draw on the women’s side.

Enjoy these photos of Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Juan Martin Del Potro (who advanced), and Maria Kirilenko and Victoria Azarenka (who didn’t) along with some other great players.

 

We enjoyed a very busy (and photogenic) Day 4 at the US Open on Thursday, catching the Venus and Serena playing doubles, Shahar Peer beating down Carla Suarez Navarro, Sabine Lisicki rolling an ankle after losing her match, and Dinara Safina battling though as always. Here are some of the photos we took along the way.

*fellow bloggers are more than welcome to use our photos, please link us if you do.

 

It’s not a full line-up of the Day 3 roster, but we thought we’d share some photos we snapped of Marat Safin, Kim Clijsters, Rafael Nadal, Richard Gasquet, Victoria Azarenka, a semi-shirtless David Ferrer and others from Wednesday at the US Open.

 

The attractive woman you might not recognize is Polona Hercog - an eighteen year old Slovenian player who partnered up with Roberta Vinci in doubles (they lost on Wednesday to Glatch/Gullickson.) She was in the singles draw, but lost to another American, Christina McHale, in the first round. Basically, FreakyFritters just thought she was cute. . .