Courtesy of: Aruba Daily
A major transformation occurred at Eagle Beach these past few days. On the site of the upcoming Divi Aruba Beach Tennis Open some fifty powerful men were hammering, towing, building and hauling things in order to have a stunning stadium court ready for registration of all players.
The action on the Amstel Bright Stadium court will be jaw-dropping, but do not forget to take a look on the other courts, where you will see players from 25 countries playing their hearts out on all levels of proficiency.
A veritable village is build, housing the food court, the bar and the tents selling clothes and gear. And VIPs will get the royal treatment on a special VIP deck.
The event has grown explosively into the largest sporting event on the island. 1100 (950 adults and 150 juniors) professional and amateur players from around the world will be crowding the 30 courts, each and every one intent on showing his or her best moves, greatest bikinis or latest outfits. With around 800 players from USA, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Mexico, Chile, Bermuda, Netherlands, Belgium, France, Germany, Curacao, Bonaire, Martinique and St Maarten, Slovenia, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Japan and Switzerland, from the age of 6 up to 69 competing, this event certainly is the biggest beach tennis competition of the world!
The 2014 Divi Aruba Beach Tennis Open will be bigger and better than last year. The number of players has doubled, with even more international participants than locals playing in the soft sand of Eagle Beach, and the event’s prize money has been raised to US 34,500, hereby making the Aruba event the biggest money tournament in the world.
Multiple local radio stations will be broadcasting live from the site and Players’ profiles and a live stream (diariotv.com) as well as updates and scores can be watched on a LED screen in the stadium, while crowd pleaser DJ C.J. will be the tournament’s house DJ. His colleagues are Buda from Rio de Janeiro, Carioca Deejay and Aruba’s famous international ace in the hole, Mr. Nutzbeatz, who is going to play during the after party on closing Sunday.
The world’s highest-ranked Beach Tennis professionals will be flying to Aruba to play the singles, doubles and the Nations Cup. Among them Marco Garavini (no.1), Alessandro Calbucci (2), Vinicius Font (3), Alex Mingozzi (4), the ladies favorite Matteo Marighella (9), ladies Joana Cortez (4), Flavia Muniz (5) Samantha Brijan (7) and our own Maria Buuts (2). Venezuelan participation is strong with Jorge and Pedro Penalvert (19) and Aruba’s best pro’s Randy Helgers (88) and Ricorado de Vreede.
The Divi Aruba Beach Tennis Open is held from November 17 – 23. After the Opening Night on Monday, singles will get underway on Tuesday. On Wednesday the elimination round is held, while the Junior Tournament sees its first matches. Thursday starts off with the popular Nations Cup, the Team Cup for Open, Advanced, Intermediate and fun categories and the knock-out draw of the Junior event. On Friday Mixed Doubles are played (all levels), with the Doubles starting. On Saturday things are heating up with the rounds of 64, 32 and 16 of the ITF/Open Doubles. Sunday, November 23 is the day of the finals, with the after party starting right after the awards ceremony on the Amstel Bright stadium court. Main sponsors include the Aruba Tourism Authority (ATA) and Amstel Bright.
Photos show a great group of handsome marines posing with one of the organizers of the 2014 Divi Aruba Beach Tennis Open, Jochem Ros and Eagle Beach during its transformation.
