The Stuttgart Open, also known by its sponsored name Porsche Tennis Grand Prix, is a women's

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...

tournament held in

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the Sw ...

, Germany (until 2005, in Filderstadt, a southern suburb of Stuttgart). Held since 1978, the tournament is the oldest women's indoor tournament in Europe. The event was part of the Tier II category from 1990 until 2008 and as of 2009 has been a Premier tournament on the

WTA Tour The WTA Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for women organized by the Women's Tennis Association. The second-tier tour is the WTA 125K series, and third-tier is the ITF Women's Circuit. The men's equivalent is the ATP Tour. WTA Tour tou ...

. The singles champion receives prize money and a

Porsche Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, usually shortened to Porsche (; see below), is a German automobile manufacturer specializing in high-performance sports cars, SUVs and sedans, headquartered in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The company ...

sports car. Until 2008 the tournament was played on

hardcourt A hardcourt (or hard court) is a surface or floor on which a sport is played, most usually in reference to tennis courts. It is typically made of rigid materials such as asphalt or concrete, and covered with acrylic resins to seal the surface and ...

in autumn. Since 2009 it is played on

clay court A clay court is one of the types of tennis court on which the sport of tennis, originally known as "lawn tennis", is played. Clay courts are made of crushed stone, brick, shale, or other unbound mineral aggregate depending on the tournament. T ...

in spring, as a warm-up tournament to the

French Open The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and ve ...

, making it the first indoor clay court event on the women's tour. The players voted for the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix as their favourite Premier tournament in 2007, 2008, 2010–2012, 2014–2017. The tournament has been won by many former number ones and Grand Slam champions.

Martina Navratilova Martina Navratilova ( cs, Martina Navrátilová ; ; born October 18, 1956) is a Czech–American, former professional tennis player. Widely considered among the greatest tennis players of all time, Navratilova won 18 major singles titles, 31 maj ...

holds the record for most singles wins at the event, with six titles between 1982 and 1992, in addition to eight doubles titles.

Tracy Austin Tracy Ann Austin Holt (born December 12, 1962) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. She won three Grand Slam titles: the women's singles titles at the 1979 and 1981 US Opens, and the mixed doubles title at the 1980 Wimbledon ...

and Martina Hingis both come second with four wins each in the singles event, with Austin winning four consecutive. This is followed by

Lindsay Davenport Lindsay Ann Davenport Leach (born June 8, 1976) is an American former professional tennis player. Davenport was ranked singles world No. 1 for a total of 98 weeks, and was the year-end singles world No. 1 four times (1998, 2001, 2004, and 2005) ...

and

Maria Sharapova Maria Yuryevna Sharapova ( , ; rus, Мари́я Ю́рьевна Шара́пова, p=mɐˈrʲijə ʂɐˈrapəvə, a=Maria_sharapova.ogg; born 19 April 1987) is a Russian former world No. 1 tennis player. She competed on the WTA Tour from 2 ...

with three wins each.

Iga Świątek Iga Natalia Świątek (; born 31 May 2001) is a Polish professional tennis player. She is currently ranked world No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA). Świątek is a three-time major singles champion, having won the French Open in 20 ...

is the current champion.

History

The tournament was founded by businessman Dieter Fischer who had organized a men's exhibition tournament in Filderstadt in 1977 to open his tennis centre. After failing to schedule a men's event in 1978 a license for a Tier II women's tournament was purchased for $100,000 and the first edition was held in October 1978, won by 15-year old

. In March 1979 a men's tournament was held, won by

Wojciech Fibak Wojciech Fibak (; popularly Wojtek Fibak ; born 30 August 1952) is a former professional tennis player and Polish entrepreneur and art collector. Fibak is best known for his doubles success with Dutch pro Tom Okker and Australian Kim Warwick, ...

, but this event was discontinued as it required too much effort to organize two tournaments annually with a volunteer force. In 1992 a request for promotion to the Tier I category was rejected by the WTA on the grounds that the tournament's centre court, with a 3,000-seat capacity, was too small. In 2002 Fischer sold the tournament licence to Porsche who had been the official sponsor since the first edition.

Past finals

Singles

Doubles

Notes

References

External links

Official site
{{navboxes, title=Previous women's tournament categories (1990–2020) , list1= {{WTA Premier tournaments {{WTA Tier II tournaments Tennis tournaments in Germany Indoor tennis tournaments Hard court tennis tournaments Clay court tennis tournaments WTA Tour Recurring sporting events established in 1978