The ATP Masters events, known as ATP Masters 1000 tournaments since 2009, are an annual series of nine tennis tournaments featuring the top-ranked players on the ATP Tour since its inception in 1990.[1] The Masters tournaments, sitting below the Grand Slam tournaments and the year-end championships, make up the most coveted trophies on the annual ATP Tour calendar. In addition to the quadrennial Summer Olympics, they are collectively known as the 'Big Titles'.[2]
The Masters series was introduced in 1990 with the inception of the ATP Tour by bringing together the nine most prestigious tournaments of the Grand Prix Super Series of the preceding ITF Grand Prix Circuit. Results in ATP Masters events earn players more ranking points than regular tournaments but less than Grand Slam events or the year-end ATP Finals. Up until 2007, most Masters finals were contested as best-of-five-set matches, but from 2008 all events were decided in best-of-three-set matches.
As part of a shake-up of the tennis circuit in 2009, the Masters Series became the ATP Tour Masters 1000, with the addition of the number 1000 referring to the number of ranking points earned by the winner of each tournament. Contrary to earlier plans, the number of tournaments was not reduced from nine to eight and the Monte-Carlo Masters remained part of the series although, unlike the other events, it does not have a mandatory player commitment. The Hamburg Masters event was downgraded to an ATP Tour 500 event. The Madrid Masters moved to May and onto clay courts. A new tournament in Shanghai replaced the Hamburg Masters and took over Madrid's former October indoor slot. In 2011, six of the nine Masters level tournaments were combined ATP and WTA events.
In 2009, the Shanghai Masters replaced the Madrid Open, which was until then held as an indoor event, in the eighth slot of the year with the Madrid Open switched to clay courts, replacing the Hamburg Open in the spring clay court season. The Shanghai Masters was designated as an outdoor event despite the facility having a retractable roof and having been used as the indoor venue for the ATP Finals from 2005 until 2008. Other than Hamburg, the tournaments defunct between 1990 and 2009 were Stockholm (1990–1994) and Stuttgart (1995–2001), which were held as indoor events in the eighth slot.
^ Djokovic won all current nine Masters series events, except ATP's now defunct Hamburg (clay) and Madrid (hard indoor) Masters events played in his career.