With the historic breakthroughs of Chinese athletes in the international arena, tennis has set off another boom in the land of China. At present, hard tennis courts are still the most mainstream type of court in China, but with Li Na winning her first Grand Slam title at the 2011 French Open and Zheng Qinwen winning the first singles gold medal in Chinese tennis history at the Paris Olympics, the emotional bond between Chinese tennis lovers and clay has become deeper. Just this year, Huzhou, with its beautiful mountains and rivers, also ushered in this intoxicating red, the eagerly awaited "Asian Clay Tennis No. 1 Hall" was officially completed in Wuxing, Huzhou, which is built in accordance with the highest international Roland Garros standard tennis center is currently the largest clay tennis base in Asia, filling the scarcity of domestic clay courts, and will become a strong stroke in China's clay tennis culture in the future.

Huzhou tennis set sail again on clay

Huzhou International Clay Tennis Center has a total of 18 tennis courts, of which 14 are clay courts, and 4 high-standard acrylic hard courts, including a 5,000-seat center court and a 2,000-seat secondary court. The tennis center is only a 10-minute drive from Huzhou East Railway Station, with convenient transportation, beautiful environment and significant location advantages.

From April 21st to 27th, Huzhou International Clay Tennis Center will welcome the first large-scale professional tennis tournament to settle in the China Tennis Tour CTA1000-level event, when Huzhou will be the starting city of the 2025 China Tennis Tour, attracting professional tennis players from all over the country to participate.

In the future, Huzhou International Clay Tennis Center will not only be used as a venue for large-scale events and become an important part of China's tennis map, but also from the perspective of tennis culture, the completion of this tennis center will also enable more Chinese tennis enthusiasts to appreciate the vitality and charm of clay tennis, experience the cultural connotation and spiritual core of the century-old heritage of clay tennis courts, and satisfy the "clay complex" in everyone's hearts.

How much do you know about clay tennis?

Nadal (Photo: Li Jianyi)

When it comes to clay, the first name that comes to mind must be the Spanish king Rafael Nadal, who has won the Musketeer Cup at Roland Garros 14 times, set numerous records on clay, and is deservedly the best clay tennis player of all time. Roland Garros is the only Grand Slam tournament to be held on clay, the French Open, and is the "temple level" of clay events. There are also many historic and prestigious clay tournaments, such as the Monte Carlo Masters, which borders the Mediterranean coastline, the Madrid Open in Spain, and the Rome Open, which is nearly 100 years old. The Europe, where these tournaments take place, is the birthplace of clay tennis, with more than two-thirds of European tennis courts on clay courts, and often the best clay players grew up there.

Roland Garros (Photo: Li Jianyi)

In terms of appearance, the red clay court presents a bright red color, bringing a strong visual impact, creating a warm sports atmosphere, attracting many tennis enthusiasts to sweat and show their skills on this unique court. Clay tennis courts have the following distinctive features: the surface is soft, which can provide good cushioning and reduce the impact of players on the joints during running and emergency stops; The rebound speed of the ball on the clay court is relatively slow, which requires players to have more delicate skills and more patience to handle each incoming ball, which increases the strategy and spectacle of the game; Clay courts produce unexpectedly irregular bounces, which places greater demands on the players' resilience. These characteristics pose a high physical challenge to the players, so the French Open, which is a best-of-five tournament, is the most physically demanding of the four Grand Slams.

Clay courts are not only an important type of court in tennis, but also have great training value for amateur and junior players because they can protect against shock absorption and cushioning and reduce sports injuries. As a natural site, red clay will present different differences under different weather conditions. When the temperature is higher and the sun is stronger, the clay court will become harder in outdoor conditions, and the speed of hitting the ball will increase. In rainy weather, the humid environment will make the ball heavier and more multi-shot rounds.

Penalty and maintenance of clay

Due to the soft nature of clay courts, the imprint of the ball is clearly visible on the court, so when a player disagrees with a line-of-line decision, the referee can come off the court to determine whether the ball is out of bounds based on the ball print, which can often be an interesting episode on clay. This approach is indeed subjective and accompanied by a certain amount of penalty errors. However, professional tennis will gradually introduce the Hawkeye system in this year's clay tournament to reduce more penalty errors.

When watching a clay match, I'm sure you'll notice that there are staff watering the field during the disc break or break to keep the soil moist. When watering, the water pipe head needs to be kept upwards at 45 degrees until a layer of splash appears on the surface of the laterite, and the water needs to be kept uniformly as a whole. The maintenance team's work doesn't stop there, as they need to make sure the field is wet and leveled before each match and between sets, first by mopping the field with a mop, then sweeping away the red clay from the floating line, and finally sprinkling the field with water.

Due to the high cost, difficult maintenance factors, clay rarely appears in China's public tennis life, the development of clay tennis in China still needs a certain amount of time and efforts, I believe that in the vigorous development of China's economy and the continuous agitation of the tennis wave, clay courts will really enter the public eye in the future, adding more color to the national sports life.