I hope you have enjoyed our photo coverage of the Prudential Hong Kong Tennis Open, as our photographer Jimmie48 handled the sauna conditions to bring us wonderful action shots on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Tournament organizers appreciated his work and even shared his photos on their official Facebook page.
The ambiance of the tournament sure is stunning, as you can see, but weather conditions not as much. Imagine when veteran Daniela Hantuchova said that she played in the most challenging heat of her entire career. It wasn’t easy being a spectator either! Here’s how the audience fought the heat.
And now you’re trying to imagine how the players felt. Well, this photo of Jarmila Gajdosova’s flying sweat sums it up beautifully! 🙂 Thumbs up for Venus Williams’ EleVen Women’s Vintage Closed Grip Print Dress, we can’t see any sweat marks! 😀
Anyway, who are the last four women standing? Top seed Sabine Lisicki, third seed Karolina Pliskova, Francesca Schiavone and Alison Van Uytvanck. They all made the semifinals on Friday.
Pliskova overcame China’s fifth seed Zheng Jie 6-1 6-3 in one hour and eight minutes, actually in more than five hours if we count the rain delays (yes, rain also troubled this tournament). Next for the Czeck is Alison Van Uytvanck, who followed up her upset of Daniela Hantuchova with a 6-4 6-2 win over Jarmila Gajdosova. Lisicki beat Chinese Zheng Saisai 6-4 6-3 and her semifinal opponent will be Shiavone, the 6-2 6-2 winner over seventh seed Jana Cepelova in the quarters.
Here are our semifinalists in pictures.
The flying sweat photo is very impressive: without knowing, one would believe that it has been photoshoped). It would deserve exposure beyond this blog!
Gregoire Gentil, definitely, he captured every drop of sweat! I’ve also shared the photo on Twitter, FB and Pinterest. Feel free to share it on your social network profiles as well 😉