Puerto Rico Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and Unincorporated ...

Monica Puig Monica Puig Marchán, (born September 27, 1993) is a Puerto Rican former professional tennis player. She is the first Puerto Rican in history to win a gold medal at the Olympics while representing Puerto Rico, having done so in 2016 at th ...

defeated

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Angelique Kerber Angelique Kerber (; born 18 January 1988) is a German professional tennis player. She has been ranked as high as world No. 1, for a total of 34 weeks, and won three major titles at the 2016 Australian Open, the 2016 US Open, and the 2018 Wim ...

in the final, 6–4, 4–6, 6–1 to win the gold medal in Women's Singles

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 ...

at the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...

. It was Puerto Rico's first Olympic gold medal, and Puig became the first unseeded female player to win the Olympic tennis gold medal. In the bronze medal match, the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

Petra Kvitová Petra Kvitová, OLY ( , ; born 8 March 1990) is a Czech professional tennis player. Known for her powerful left-handed groundstrokes and variety, Kvitová has won 29 career singles titles, including two major titles at Wimbledon in 2011 and i ...

defeated the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Madison Keys Madison Keys (born February 17, 1995) is an American professional tennis player. She has been ranked as high as world No. 7 by the Women's Tennis Association The Women's Tennis Association (WTA) is the principal organizing body of women's ...

7–5, 2–6, 6–2. It was Germany's first medal in women's singles since

1992 File:1992 Events Collage V1.png, From left, clockwise: 1992 Los Angeles riots, Riots break out across Los Angeles, California after the Police brutality, police beating of Rodney King; El Al Flight 1862 crashes into a residential apartment buildi ...

and the Czech Republic's first since 1996. The tournament was held from 6 to 13 August 2016 at the Olympic Tennis Centre in the

Barra Olympic Park The Barra Olympic Park (Brazilian Portuguese: ''Parque Olímpico da Barra''), originally the City of Sports Complex, is a cluster of nine sporting venues in Barra da Tijuca, in the west zone of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The park, which served as th ...

Barra da Tijuca Barra da Tijuca () (usually known as Barra) is an upper-class neighborhood or bairro in the Rio de Janeiro#West Zone, West Zone of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, located in the western portion of the city on the Atlantic Ocean. Barra is well known for it ...

in the west zone of

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...

. The draw for the event was conducted at 11 a.m. local time on Thursday, 4 August. There were 64 competitors from 36 nations.

Background

This was the 13th appearance of the women's singles tennis. A women's event was held only once during the first three Games (only men's tennis was played in 1896 and 1904), but has been held at every Olympics for which there was a tennis tournament since 1908. Tennis was not a medal sport from 1928 to 1984, though there were demonstration events in 1968 and 1984. Returning from the 2012 Games were gold medalist

Serena Williams Serena Jameka Williams (born September 26, 1981) is an American inactive professional tennis player. Considered among the greatest tennis players of all time, she was ranked world No. 1 in singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for ...

of the United States and quarter-finalists

of Germany,

Caroline Wozniacki Caroline Wozniacki (; born 11 July 1990) is a Danish former professional tennis player. She was ranked world No. 1 in singles for a total of 71 weeks, including at the end of 2010 and 2011. She achieved the top ranking for the first time on 11 ...

of Denmark, and

of the Czech Republic. The 2000 champion,

Venus Williams Venus Ebony Starr Williams (born June 17, 1980) is an American professional tennis player. A former world No. 1 in both singles and doubles, Williams has won seven Grand Slam singles titles, five at Wimbledon and two at the US Open. She is ...

, was also back for her fifth Olympic singles appearance (sister Serena was only on her third). Serena Williams and Kerber were the top two seeds this Games, with Venus #5. Montenegro and Turkey each made their debut in the event. France made its 12th appearance, most among nations to that point, having missed only the 1908 Games in London (when only British players competed).

Qualification

Qualification for the women's singles was primarily through the WTA ranking list of 6 June 2016. An additional restriction was that players had to have been part of a nominated team for three

Billie Jean King Cup The Billie Jean King Cup (or the BJK Cup) is the premier international team competition in women's tennis, launched as the Federation Cup in 1963 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the International Tennis Federation (ITF). The name was cha ...

events between 2013 and 2016 (with some exceptions). Nations had been limited to four players in the event since the 2000 Games. There were 64 quota places available for women's singles. The first 56 were assigned through the world ranking. There were two Tripartite Commission invitation places and 6 final qualification places allocated by the ITF based on continental and national representation along with world rankings.

Competition format

The competition was a single-elimination tournament with a bronze medal match. Matches were in best-of-3 sets. A

tiebreak In games and sports, a tiebreaker or tiebreak is used to determine a winner from among players or teams that are tied at the end of a contest, or a set of contests. General operation In matches In some situations, the tiebreaker may consi ...

would be played in all sets reaching 6–6 (previously, no tiebreak would be used in the third set of a match).

Schedule

Seeds

''(third round)'' ''(final, silver medalist)'' ''(third round)'' ''(first round)'' ''(first round)'' ''(first round)'' ''(semifinals, fourth place)'' ''(third round)'' ''(third round)'' ''(quarterfinals)'' ''(semifinals, bronze medalist)'' ''(first round)'' ''(third round)'' ''(second round)'' ''(quarterfinals)'' ''(second round)''

Draw

* TRI = Tripartite invitation * IP = ITF place

Finals

Top half

Section 1

Section 2

Bottom half

Section 3

Section 4

Participating nations

References

External links

Women's Singles Drawsheet: Results

Olympic Tennis Event

Entry List
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tennis at the 2016 Summer Olympics - Women's Singles Women's Singles Women's events at the 2016 Summer Olympics