By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Thursday, August 15, 2024
The 2024 US Open has an ambitious attendance aim and several policy changes in store. Here's what you need to know.
Photo credit: US Open/USTA
Tennis is a numbers game.
The 2024 US Open will bring some declarative digits.
More: US Open to Host First Finals Fan Fest
The Flushing Meadows major will offer a tennis-record $75 million in prize money, including a $100,000 payday for first-round participants.
Main-draw action begins on Monday, August 26th with a total of 894 matches contested in 13 different US Open competitions over an 18-day period.
Coming off a record-setting 2023 US Open, the USTA is planning to super size this season’s final Grand Slam.
Organizers set an ambitious aim for the 2024 US Open: Eclipse 1 million fans over the entire three-week event, which includes Fan Week and US Open qualifying starting next week.
That would make the Open the first Grand Slam to draw 1 million fans—a feat it nearly achieved last year.
Novak Djokovic's hunt for history and his 24th Grand Slam crown and 19-year-old Coco Gauff's dramatic run to her maiden major championship captivated US Open fans who flocked through the gates at Flushing Meadows last summer.
The 2023 US Open set two- and three-week attendance records and becoming the first Grand Slam to welcome more than 950,000 spectators over a three-week period.
The US Open welcomed 957,387 fans over the 20 days encompassing the Main Draw and Fan Week, a near 8-percent increase over 2022.
More fans this month will have more room to roam.
In a Zoom call with about 75 members of the media on Wednesday, USTA executives announced some policy changes, including “controlled movement” in all US Open stadiums.
That means US Open fans will be allowed to move in between games. So if you run out to use the restroom or buy a beer, you will be able to return to your set at the end of the games whereas traditionally fans were not permitted entry until changeovers.
Here are some of the 2024 US Open policy changes, Tournament Director Stacey Allaster, USTA President Dr. Brian Hainline and USTA CEO Lew Sherr announced in yesterday’s Zoom Call.
One Million Fans
The USTA has added some ticketed events during Fan Week and is launching Finals Fan Fest, which will feature expanded grounds passes, including official viewing parties in Louis Armstrong Stadium for both the women’s and men’s finals, as well as added seating options to view the big screens in Fountain Plaza.
Executives expect to draw more than 200,000 fans during US Open Fan Week, which officially starts this Sunday night with a Dierks Bentley concert, and if that happens it would be track to eclipse 1 million fans for the entire three-week event.
At the 2023 US Open, All 25 sessions in Arthur Ashe Stadium sold out for the second year in a row, and both the Men's (28,804) and Women's Championship (28,143) sessions were the highest-attended Championship sessions in US Open history.
The question: Is Bigger always better for tennis?
If you’ve ever sat in the very top rows of Arthur Ashe Stadium, then you know the nosebleed neighborhood is not always conducive for viewing. The court can resemble a postage stamp and the ball can look as big as a pebble from the very top of Ashe Stadium. Arthur Ashe Stadium, while a wondrous spectacle especially at night, is too big for tennis when you’re sitting in the upper deck if you want to watch tennis, which is presumably the point, right?
The new events represent new revenue streams and new ways for the USTA to sell more tickets to the Open, which is the economic engine for its year-round programs.
While it’s a positive to welcome so many fans. New York is coming off one of its hottest Julys in recent history and you don’t want to put fans at health risk and with a few days of broiling heat and blistering humidity. In the August swelter, it is a concern seeing elderly fans packed among thousands. There were a couple of medical episodes where fans were treated for illness and released at the 2023 US Open.
Bringing more people through the gates doesn’t necessarily mean you’re bringing fans closer to the game, especially sitting in the cavernous Ashe where there can be a disconnect between court and upper-deck crowd. Still, there’s nothing like the energy and electricity New York fans generate so it will be fascinating to see how the new US Open Finals Fan Fest draws in its debut.
Old Ball, Please
The US Open women’s tennis ball will come with a familiar bounce.
The US Open is going back to the Wilson Regular Duty felt ball for women’s events.
At the 2023 US Open, for the first time in years, the women played with the slightly heavier Wilson US Open Extra Duty felt ball rather than the Wilson US Open Regular Duty felt ball.
The trial basis change came in response to several star players, including Iga Swiatek, calling on the tournament to make the change in 2023.
The Open complied, though some players experienced arm problems, including 2023 Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrousova and 2023. Roland Garros finalist Karolina Muchova, who played the semifinals wearing a black sleeve around her right arm, while others felt the ball change benefited heavy hitters most.
US Open Tournament Director Allaster, the former WTA CEO, said the decision to go back to the Regular Duty Wilson ball was “made by the WTA, its players through a survey, and the players council."
Currently, women are playing with the US Open Regular Duty Wilson ball in Cincinnati.
"The female athletes have been playing with the Wilson Regular Duty ball all summer in the lead-up events to the US Open,” Stacey Allaster said.
Living After Midnight: Late-Night Match Policy
In the city that never sleeps, the Open isn’t adopting a curfew, but it is permitting the referee the power to move late-night matches to an open court.
“In the event that we have the second match of the evening on Ashe or the last match on Armstrong, if those matches have not gone on by 11:15 p.m., the referee will have the discretion to move the match,” Stacey Allaster said. “That's going to depend on many variables, like do we have the broadcast team ready, do we have a ball crew, so forth. But we're defining that it's a possibility.
“The athletes will know that in the event that we do get to that position, then the referee will make that decision.”
New Roof Policy
In a reprieve for players and fans, the US Open has altered it’s roof policy based on extreme heat.
When the US Open initially introduced the retractable roof over Arthur Ashe Stadium, officials said they would not use the roof to combat the sometime whipping winds that can arise from nearby Flushing Bay.
Extreme heat prompted officials to partially close the roof to provide some shade during the 2023 US Open.
The new roof policy means the tournament referee has discretion to partially close the roof either before the match or at the end of a set.
“We've now made it a policy so the athletes will know when the roof will and will not open and close,” Allaster said. “Depending upon the extreme heat, the referee will have the ability to close the roof, partially shade the court before the match orr at the end of a set. The roof will only be closed in the threat of inclement weather or if it's raining.”
Tablet Technology
For years, players and coaches have argued calls like not-ups and net touches should be reviewable.
At this US Open, a total of eight courts will feature video review. Additionally, the Open will use “roaming tablets” when there are defaults. Under this new rule, the referee or Grand Slam supervisor can review the incident that resulted in a default on a tablet to assess “the situation of a default code.”
“We think that's really important in those really crucial moments during the competition,” Allaster said, a rule that will be welcome by players including Denis Shapovalov, who was defaulted in Washington, DC earlier this month after cursing at a heckling fan.