Wimbledon has increased its prize money by 7% at this year’s championship, bringing its total to £53.5 million ($72.59 million). On Thursday, the All-England lawn tennis club announced a significant increase. This has almost doubled the winnings since 2015.
The singles champions are up 11.1% since last year when Carlos Alcaraz and Barbora Krezikova won the men’s and women’s singles titles. Winners of this year’s individual tournament will be awarded the highest awards in all Grand Slam tournaments.
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Players who were eliminated in the first round of the singles competition will increase by 10% from last year, but the prize money will rise by 4.4%, with a mix of double 4.3% and wheelchair and quad wheelchair 5.6%.
Wimbledon adjusted after athletes campaigned to improve their Grand Slam prizes and ensured a more equitable revenue distribution. AELTC chair Deborah Jevans said the club said, “We heard the players. We worked with them.
“But focusing solely on prize money in the four events, Grand Slams, does not reach the heart of the tennis challenge,” Jevance added. “The challenge with tennis is the fact that players don’t have an offseason, and they want it. They’re increasing the number of injuries they’re talking about.”
Jevans also noted how Wimbledon continues to work with the tour to better compensate athletes.
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The Wimbledon Championship will start on June 30th and run until July 13th. Apart from paying more to players, AELTC is taking more steps this year to improve the Wimbledon experience.
First of all, the tournament will be running once the finals are held. The club said the doubles finals on July 12th and 13th will begin at 1pm local time (8am ET) and the singles final will begin at 4pm local time.
Additionally, this year’s tournament will be the first to showcase the electronic line call system more than the line judge. According to AELTC CEO Sally Bolton, they use the latest technology to participate in other tournaments from the old system from “The The The The The The The The.”
“They are the extra eyes and ears, and the umpire assistants in the chair. We have about 80 throughout the championship,” Bolton said according to ESPN. “They also provide one of our resilience if our electronic line calling system goes down at any time.”
