The four major tournaments in tennis take place during different times of the year – The Australian Open is held in January, the French Open is held in June, Wimbledon is held in July, and the US Open is held in September. All of the main tournaments have multiple courts where the matches are played, but each major tournament also has one prominent court where all of the key matches are played. We have the Rod Laver Arena at the Australian Open, the Centre Court at Wimbledon, the Arthur Ashe Court at the US Open, and the Phillippe Chatrier Court at the French Open.
How Phillippe Chatrier Court was Named
The court is named after the famous French tennis player Phillippe Chatrier. Chatrier was born in the French city of Créteil. In 1945, he won the French junior tennis championship. Upon retiring, he went into journalism. In addition to serving as the sports and news editor for the Paris daily newspaper Paris-Presse, he launched the magazine Tennis de France in 1953.
In 1968, Chatrier participated in the union of the professional and amateur tennis associations. From 1968 to 1973, he served as vice president of the French Tennis Federation (Fédération française de tennis), and in 1969, he led his country’s Davis Cup team.
Tennis was reinstated into the Olympic program in 1981, first as a demonstration sport at the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, and then as a full Olympic event starting with the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul. This was done under his leadership. In 1988, he joined the International Olympic Committee.
Chatrier passed away on June 22, 2000, in Dinard. In 2001, the Court Philippe Chatrier was renamed in his honor at the Stade de Roland Garros, the site of the French Open in Paris.
