Wimbledon prize money to be increased to £28.1m
Prize money has doubled in five years
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Your support makes all the difference.The world’s most successful players will become richer than ever this summer after Wimbledon announced a five per cent increase in prize money.
Although the pay increases have slowed in the last three years, at £28.1million the total prize money at Wimbledon is now almost double what it was five years ago (£14.6m).
The men’s and women’s singles champions will both earn £2m this summer, which is an increase of 6.4 per cent on what they received last year. First-round losers, meanwhile, will be paid £30,000, which in some cases could be more than they will earn for the rest of the year.
Prize money for the men’s and women’s doubles will go up by 3.1 per cent – the winning pairs in each competition will share £350,000 – but there is no increase in the rewards in the mixed doubles.
Wheelchair players will earn a total of £200,000, which is an increase of 212.5 per cent on last year. This will follow the introduction of wheelchair singles competitions for the first time this summer.
Phil Brook, the chairman of the All England Club, believes that Wimbledon’s total prize pot for 2016 will be the biggest ever awarded in tennis, though he expects the US Open to exceed the figure later this summer.
Brook said that work on the new retractable roof over No 1 Court would begin in earnest after this summer’s Championships. There will be no roof over the court in 2017, but a new fixed roof should be built by 2018 and the retractable cover is scheduled to be in place by the summer of 2019.
Two extra rows of seats will be installed on No 1 Court as part of the building work, while new and bigger seats will be installed throughout the stadium, increasing its capacity by about 900 places to approximately 12,400.
Meanwhile ground pass holders will have more access to seats on Court No 3 this year. Three-quarters of all seats on the court will be made available to them. This summer’s tournament will be the last for Court 19, which will be converted into a public plaza in time for next year’s Championships.
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