Indian Wells, like Shanghai, wants its own category

 Indian Wells, as Shanghai, has asked to become a new category. The situation for the tournament is easy : they want to grow up again and again, and the Masters 1000 box seems now to be to tight. Ray Moore, the tournament director, confirmed it to me during an interview : he wants the ATP to accept the creation of a kind of Super Masters category, as Shanghai does except the chinese, who also asks to become a 2 week event, wants to stay men only : "We talked to the ATP about that too. We're very interested in having a different category so we can have more points and more prize money for the players." It would be a new category just under the Grand Slam events and above the Masters 1000.

And it's no longer just a wish : Moore has high hopes that it could happen in 2019. "It could come in 2019 but not before as right now the system is set through 2018. So the next year or two the ATP and the WTA will begin to discuss a different format, maybe new categories and we look forward to that. And maybe we'd go to a 128 draw, right now we're a 96 draw."

  When you see the facilities the city of Indian Wells and the tournament direction have set up in the californian desert, it seems logical to see their ambitions growing. When you have the space, the money and the will : why not dream big ? "We could be a Grand Slam, says Moore, we have the facilities and the space, and in terms of land we're twice the size of Wimbledon, the French Open or the Australian Open. But we're very happy where we are. We're just always pushing to improve, like next year we’re gonna improve Stadium 1 a lot, and then the year after that we’re gonna build Stadium 3. Tennis is a global sports with a lot of potential, lots of opportunities." From what I know so far, the ATP is pretty open to the project, totally agreeing with Indian Wells and Shanghai that they can't be compared anymore to the other Masters 1000. Everything is now looking like some major changes are going to happen in 2019 regarding the calendar and the formats of some events. Easy to guess that smaller tournaments and less rich Masters 1000 are starting to brace themselves.