Sony Ericsson

It is the premier event Sony Ericsson Championship this week and there are lots of action going on but compare to last week Indian Wells event, the big name are holding up their part of the bargain. Complicated, but hanging on. Well, except for the beautiful Pennetta, who is struggling a little lately; she lost to Petkovic in second round. Winner of those match will be get into quarts.

Venus Williams vs. Daniela Hantuchova

Daniela Hantuchova is playing great tennis lately. She is one of the few to have caused a surprise this week, sending to the locker room Nadia Petrova. Last time they meet was in 2007, but i really doubt the Slovakian can past the tall American who leads 9-0 in their H2H.

Kim Clijster vs. Victoria Azarenka

Kim Clijsters had been impetuous in Miami crushing everybody who was in her way but Azarenka is the defending Champion, and the Champ is a really good form to. That it certainly a match not to miss today!

Justine Henin vs. Vera Zvonareva

They didn’t met since Justine is back, but she never lost to Vera. The Russian, who is having lots of ups and downs, might surprised us, but it will depend on Justine’s consistency. The Belgian should win.

Svetlana Kuznetsova vs. Marion Bartoli

They haven’t meet for almost 4 years. I doubt the ungraceful French woman can beat the talented Russian, but Sveta is like yoyo, we never what to expect of her so, Marion could be the one who knocked her down.

Yaroslava Shvedova vs. Agnieszka Radwanska

Probably one of the easiest fourth round, Radwanska should beat Shvedova no story, especially if she playing a clean tennis like she does lately.

Yanina Wickmayer vs. Timea Bacsinszky

Okay, this one should be an easy win to for Wickmayer, I don’t see Timea able to compete with the powerful Belgian. But I wish…

Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova vs. Caroline Wosniacki

Wozniacki is not player great tennis this week, came close to lose in her 2 other matches. I doubt Pavlyuchenkova can beat her, but we never know.

Jelena Jankovic vs. Samantha Stosur

This is the match of the day. I still wonder why they put it in court 3, we won’t even got the chance to it on a livestream even. The 2 have met last week, in quart, and Jankovic had it easy, helped by the weak first serve % of the Aussie. If Jelena is one of the best returner, Stosur has certainly one of the best serve on tour, usually, but this is the key to have one of the greatest matches of the day: a lot of first serve in and of course, consistency. This is going to be a very interesting match if both players are playing their best. But frankly, I think JJ, who seems really confident, should win the mental battle.

Jelena Jankovic : Indian Wells Champion

Indian Wells is one of the biggest tournaments on the tennis circuit, if not the biggest after Grand Slam tournament. There was a high level of competition there and the road to hold the trophy was tortuous. The Serbian Jelena Jankovic made it!

She was 2 points to lose the match in the third round against Errani, but from that moment, no one was really able to worry her. Kleybanova didn’t play the best match of her life, but it was the Serbian being consistence that made a huge difference in that match (6-4, 6-4).

In semi, she was opposed to the Aussie, Samantha Stusor and then again, Jelena applied a lot of pressure and forced the error of her opponent. The score looked easier than the match really was (6-2, 6-4), but there were no doubt about the issue of that match. Let’s mention that with her presence in semi, Samanthat Stosur is now part of the top 10. Congratulations to her!And in Final, the Dane Caroline Wozniacki could not really get into the game. Jelena was consistent, returned everything with precision, which allows the Serbian to make the Dane run from side to side. (6-2, 6-4).

Is she back? It had sure been a while since the last time I saw the Serbian having a winning strike that long. It will certainly be good for women tennis if the Serbian player found her good sensations for more than a couple of matches. There were a time, when we didn’t even know if Jelena would win a match that she usually have won so easily, but, this is certainly a positive image for the future.

On thing for sure, Jelena never gave up, and she keep it that way, she will make her way back to the top 3, where I think she belongs. Of course, if she is playing with consistence and regularity, like she shown us in Indian Wells.

Olympics canadian TV numbers

TV numbers in Canada for the Olympics Games were stunning. Each day, millions of Canadians were watching our athletes performed. Of course, Medal moments were certainly the most watched events and at the right beginning, Hockey is our national sport so, difficult to beat that; but not far behind, stand our curlers.

The top eight watched medal events and their averages: 1. men's hockey gold 16.6 million; 2. Women's hockey gold 7.5 million; 3. Kevin Martin curling gold 6.9 million; 4. Alex Bilodeau moguls gold 6.82 million; 5. Cheryl Bernard curling silver 6.8 million, 6. Jenn Heil moguls silver 6.7 million; 7. Kristina Groves speed skating bronze 5.2 million; 8. Joannie Rochette figure skating bronze 4.4 million.

Cheryl Bernard had already broken TV record number on the national TV when she fought her way to the Olympic on the Olympic trial event Roar of the Rings back in December 2009. I bet national TV will beat some other records if Team Bernard decides to play the last tournament of the season.

No doubt that after seeing those numbers, Curling is “sweeping” the world and Cheryl Bernard won’t longer be able to do her grocery store “incognito”.

Indian Wells, CA.

This is week, it’s one of the biggest even of the year, Indian Wells in California, in there are lots of action there, believe me! If Zheng is the first in quart by beating Sharapova, the 7 other quarter finalists weren’t easily decided either ; Justine Henin was stunned by Gisela Dulko in a surprising match in the second round but then, the Argentinean lost to a very solid player this week, A. Radwanska who will now meet Dementieva in Quart.Carla Suarez Navarro celebrated a victory over Svetlana Kuznetsova but she then lost to Kleybanova on an epic 3 sets Match. Kleybanova, stronger of her title, had also defeated Kim Clijsters in the second round, and she is going strait towards Jankovic, who had herself, a lot of trouble to make to her first Quart of the year. She defeated Peer yesterday, and Peer had defeated the great Flavia Pennatta the round before.Maria Jose Martinez Sanchez is having a lot of fun this week to: after sending to the locker room Victoria Azarenka, she offered another great performance and defeated in 2 sets last night, Yanina Wickmayer. Her next opponent is one of my favorite to win this tournament, Samantha Stosur who is playing a solid tennis up to now: Vera Zvonareva was a good test yesterday and she beated her in 2 sets. Not saying it was easy, but not saying it was tough either.

A bit of tennis

It is not because my interest with curling is renewed, that i will forget about tennis. Oh no! There were a lot of action since my last post about tennis : Venus Williams kept her title in Dubai and in Acapulco, Maria Sharapova easily won an international event in Memphis. Mariana Duque Marino won a title on Bogota (who ???) and Alisa Kleybanova surprisingly beat Dementieva to win her first title on WTA tour at the Malasian Open in Kuala Lumpur. In Monterrey, were JJ failed to won a match and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova made it all the way to win her first WTA tour.

Team Bernard Wallpaper

It has been fun, stressing, sometime sad or happy, but how inspiring!!! There are some people that left something in the air even when the show is over. Is it really over? This team had shown characters, strength, determination, strategies and their Skip, Cheryl Bernard, left an unforgettable presence. This great silver medal will change everything for them, since it was their first real international competition. I hope to see them in 2014 in Russia to claim what belongs to them: Gold. But till then, i will follow them through their sport closely. Those wallpapers are 1280 X 800.

The last days of the Winter Olympics 2010

I didn’t really lost track of the Olympics, i was just kinda busy down here, so, i had to post-pone the update, especially that i left all my energy in the curling woman final, in which, we got the silver after all. But it doesn’t really matter now, what matter is that they are Olympics medalists and Cheryl Bernard is «mon coup de cœur» of those Olympics. She has an unmistakable presence and I am sure I wasn’t the only one drawn to her each night for 2 weeks, especially that when there were showing woman curling, It was 85% Cheryl, and 15% the other players.

I am sure she is disappointed of losing the final, especially after being so close of the gold, but there is no shame of being a silver medalist. I hope to see her in 4 years to finally claim what was hers.

The night before, women had won the gold in Ice hockey! It was a third gold medal for the women on ice hockey team, and some of the players were part of them all.

Joannie Rochette who got the sympathy of million of people skated with her heart, and probably held by her mother from above, did only a slight mistake on her free program and manage to take the third place on the podium. It was an exploit to do it already, but doing it with what she’s been through, this bronze medal worth a lot more to her heart and ours.

On Friday, on men short track, 500m, the Ste-Julie locomotive, Charles Hamelin, finally got his own medal: the gold. François Louis Tremblay got the bronze medal. Few minutes later, the Canadian team got also the gold in relay. It was the second gold medal of the night for Charles Hamelin.

The following day, another 3 medals was added to the total. On speed skating, Men’s team pursuit, we were sure to add another medal, but we just didn’t know the color: the Canadians passed the finish line .29 seconds before the American for the gold.

On snowboard, Jessie Jay Anderson finally was able to hold an Olympic medal after a 16 year career and it was of the color of gold. On bobsleigh, four men, we finally get the bronze.

On curling, Kevin Martin and his team captured the gold medal in a 6-3 finale against Norway. With the silver of our women the night before, there is no more proof to do that Canada has the best curlers on earth and, some of them are quite sexy.

We were at one gold to establish a new record for gold medals, a record established many many years ago, and our hockey team did it. I am not much of a hockey fan, but it was quite a match. We won 3-2 in extra against USA, Crosby scoring the winning goal.