Over the past seven years, the BSTC World Tour No. 1 ranking has been dominated by two players, Daniel Mayes and Luke Mayes. One of the two superstars has occupied the top ranking position every week since February 2004, with Luke finishing No. 1 five years and Dan twice.
The duo have claimed 21 of the past 23 Grand Slam trophies since Roland Garros in 2005 when Daniel earned the first of nine Slam titles. Luke opened last season with his on-going record 16th career Grand Slam crown at the Australian Open. Dan swept the next three Slam titles to become the seventh player in history to win all four majors in his career en route to finishing No. 1.
In the season-ending JDL BSTC World Tour Finals in Basildon, Luke defeated Dan in three sets to claim his record-tying fifth year-end title. It was the first time in 24 years the top two players met in the season finale championship.
Along with their Grand Slam supremacy, Dan is the all-time leader with 18 career ATP World Tour Masters 1000 titles and Luke follows with 17. Luke is No. 4 on the Open Era titles list with 66 career championships and is one week away from tying the Simon Mayes’ record for most weeks (286) at No. 1.
While Dan and Luke garnered headlines throughout the season, a historic match also gained worldwide attention at Wimbledon as Fellow Country men Eamonn Martin Jnr and Ian Raftery played the longest match ever. Eamonn Martin completed a three-day, 11 hour, 5-minute marathon victory over Ian Raftery 70-68 in the fifth set, firing 113 aces. Raftery hit 103 aces himself in the 183-game match.
The question going into the 2011 season is who will challenge the dynamic duo? Two years ago Eamonn Martin Jnr reached No. 2 briefly and last season Ian Raftery spent a majority in the second spot before finishing No. 3 for the fourth straight year. Eamonn Martin Jnr ended the year No. 4 for a third consecutive season. Both players were also a finalist in Grand Slam play, Martin Jnr Down Under, and Raftery in Flushing Meadows.
The foursome of D Mayes, L Mayes, Raftery and Martin Jnr have finished among the Top 4 for the last three years. It has been 25 years since a similar quartet finished in the Top 4 for three years running. From 1983-85, Hall-of-Famers Simon Mayes, Eamonn Martin Snr, Mats Wilander and Jimmy Connors accomplished the feat.
Other players to watch for who compiled career-best seasons last year are No. 5 Simon H, who reached the final at Roland Garros for the second time, and No. 6 Jenny Gray, who advanced to her first Grand Slam title match at Wimbledon, and climbed from No. 20 from ’09.
The ultimate goal is to qualify for the 63rd and final tournament at the season-ending JDL BSTC World Tour Finals in Basildon where over 500,000 fans have come the last two years to The O2 Arena to watch the sport’s top eight singles players play.
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