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.

 

Even with the no-shows (Williams sisters) and early upsets (Jankovic, Dementieva), GTT still managed to catch plenty of tennis babes on the grounds of this year’s BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells. Enjoy!

Hantuchova is FreakyFritter’s favorite. . .

. . .as is Maria Kirilenko

. . .and he likes Dulko, too!

[flv:http://www.gototennisblog.com/wp-content/uploads/videos/kirilenko_tsonga_warmup.flv http://www.gototennisblog.com/wp-content/uploads/kirilenko_tsonga_warmup.jpg 525 295]

Here’s Maria doing her alluring resistance band routine – there’s a hunk bonus at the end!

 

Fellow bloggers: Thanks to everyone who asked to use our photos! Please feel free to use them – we would appreciate a link back to our post, if you do.

Venus Williams beat Frenchwoman Virginie Razzano 6-4, 6-2 today in the final of the Dubai Tennis Championships. Hurray for Venus! This win gives her her 40th title (the most of the active players) and puts her in the top five for the first time since August, 2003, which is pretty crazy considering she’s won Wimbledon 3 times since then. She looks motivated and hungry for more, which is great news for the WTA.

Check out these video highlights from the final, which was more competitive than the scoreline suggests. The video also includes doubles action – Liezel Huber and Cara Black defeated Maria Kirilenko and Agnieszka Radwanska for the title, the team’s second in two weeks.

Things seem to be heating up on the women’s tour – with the Williams sisters and Dementieva all playing consistently, Mauresmo resurgent, Maria Sharapova hitting balls again, and the Serbs appearing to trade “on” and “off” weeks. Now all we need is for Justine Henin to come back and we’ve go ourselves a tour again.

Video courtsey of the WTA

Venus photo: AP /Kamran Jebreili

Okay, I didn’t know that wearing a bikini and rolling around in the sand in front of a posse of middle aged photographers qualified as a sport, but it did get Maria Kirilenko, Daniela Hantuchova and Tatiana Golovin more ink than usual in this month’s Sports IllustratedSwimsuit Issue. (Love the categories of ladies, by the way: Models, NBA Dancers and Tennis Players.) Andy Roddick’s fiance, Brooklyn Decker, makes an appearance, too. As a swimsuit modeling pro, she get’s the full bodypaint treatment. Next time, Tatiana, next time.

I, for one, think that SI is missing a major opportunity by not making a Marat Safin/Jo-Wilfried Tsonga/Rafa Nadal in Speedos issue. Perhaps we should write to Jon Wertheim about it?

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The photos are below. My husband is a big fan of the oh-so-fragile Daniela Hantuchova so I’m sure he’ll be checking those out! I prefer Tatiana Golovin, as she seems to have a real knack for the sexy poses. Practicing in her off time, perhaps?

Maria Kirilenko

 

Daniela Hantuchova

 

Tatiana Golovin

 

Click here to visit the full SI gallery, including videos.

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I’d never have guessed that Maria Kirilenko v. Stephanie Dubois would have me leaping off the couch and clapping, but it did. And it was only partially because of my undocumented Canadian citizenship. If you have this 3 hour long match on your Tivo, try to catch the final set.