{"id":767,"date":"2012-06-25T08:50:50","date_gmt":"2012-06-25T12:50:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/heavytopspin.com\/?p=767"},"modified":"2012-06-25T08:50:50","modified_gmt":"2012-06-25T12:50:50","slug":"the-aging-wimbledon-mens-draw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/2012\/06\/25\/the-aging-wimbledon-mens-draw\/","title":{"rendered":"The Aging Wimbledon Men’s Draw"},"content":{"rendered":"

Italian translation at settesei.it<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Men’s tennis is getting older, and the drift toward middle age is evident at Wimbledon this week.<\/p>\n

Of the 128 men in the main draw, 34 are at least 30 years old, while only two are in their teens. \u00a0This is just the latest step in a trend that has been evident for at least a decade.<\/p>\n

The 34 30-somethings are not just a modern-day record–the number blows recent years out of the water. \u00a0Last year’s main draw had 24 30-somethings, and that was the highest such total since 1979. \u00a0Teenagers have been on the wane for years–there have only been two in the main draw in each of the last four years, but as recently as 2001, there were eight. \u00a0In several years in the late 80s and early 90s, there were more teenagers than 30-year-olds.<\/p>\n

Whatever the explanation for this–and there are many possible ones–it’s clear that something is going on. \u00a0It takes longer than it ever has for a young rising star to establish himself on tour, and top players are able to stay healthy and competitive for as long as ever before.<\/p>\n

After the jump, find a table with more detailed results.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The table shows several stats for each year’s Wimbledon main draw: average age of the competitors, number of 30-somethings, and number of teens. \u00a0“DOBs” indicates those years where I don’t have birthdate for all entrants; it isn’t really a factor except pre-1980.<\/p>\n

YEAR  DOBs   AVG  30s  TEENS  \n2012   128  27.3   34      2  \n2011   128  26.9   24      2  \n2010   128  26.5   20      2 \n \n2009   128  26.5   19      2  \n2008   128  25.9   18      5  \n2007   128  26.2   19      7  \n2006   128  26.0   17      4  \n2005   128  25.8   23      8  \n2004   128  25.7   20      4  \n2003   128  25.4   14      5  \n2002   128  25.5   15      4  \n2001   128  25.6   18      8  \n2000   128  25.6   13      6  \n\nYEAR  DOBs   AVG  30s  TEENS  \n1999   128  25.5   12      3  \n1998   128  25.3   10      2  \n1997   128  25.2    9      5  \n1996   128  25.4   15      5  \n1995   128  25.3   13      5  \n1994   128  25.0    6      6  \n1993   128  24.9   11      5  \n1992   128  24.9    9      5  \n1991   128  24.9    9      7  \n1990   127  24.8   11     15  \n\nYEAR  DOBs   AVG  30s  TEENS  \n1989   128  24.6    9     13  \n1988   128  24.2    8      9  \n1987   128  24.6    8     10  \n1986   128  24.9   16      7  \n1985   126  25.4   16      6  \n1984   126  25.3   16     12  \n1983   126  25.1   14     11  \n1982   127  25.6   18      8  \n1981   125  26.0   19     10  \n1980   127  26.3   23      5  \n\nYEAR  DOBs   AVG  30s  TEENS  \n1979   124  26.4   26      7  \n1978   123  26.8   31      6  \n1977   124  26.4   27      6  \n1976   124  26.6   28      3  \n1975   122  26.7   26      5  \n1974   124  26.5   30      7  \n1973    95  25.3   16     15  \n1972   116  26.6   27      7  \n1971   122  26.8   27      8  \n1970   115  26.2   20      9  \n1969   116  27.0   28      6  \n1968   114  26.8   29      4<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Italian translation at settesei.it Men’s tennis is getting older, and the drift toward middle age is evident at Wimbledon this week. Of the 128 men in the main draw, 34 are at least 30 years old, while only two are in their teens. \u00a0This is just the latest step in a trend that has been … Continue reading The Aging Wimbledon Men’s Draw<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[96,122],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-research","category-wimbledon"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennisabstract.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}