awareness to social and political issues), her position as th

MASON, Ohio -- Defending champion Serena Williams initially opted to skip Cincinnati, figuring shed be just finishing up in Rio de Janeiro. An early upset changed her plans and got her back in the Western & Southern Open with more than just another trophy at stake.Her No. 1 ranking is on the line, too.Williams attempt to hold onto the top spot will be one of the main intrigues in the tournament that opened on Sunday with a couple of matches scheduled in the mens bracket. The mens draw is missing its two most notable plots -- Roger Federer trying for an unprecedented eighth Cincinnati title, and Novak Djokovic trying to finally win his first. Both are sidelined by injuries and will have to wait another year for the Masters event.Meanwhile, Williams wants to get over her loss to 21-year-old Elina Svitolina in the third round at the Olympics. She accepted a wild-card berth to get some matches in Cincinnati, where she has won the title each of the last two years.Williams heads into the tournament ranked No. 1 for the 306th week overall in her career and her 183rd in a row. Its the second-longest streak in WTA history, trailing Steffi Grafs 186 consecutive weeks. She first topped the rankings in July 2002 and, at age 34, is the oldest woman to hold the top spot since the computer rankings were introduced in 1975.Second-ranked Angelique Kerber will take over the top spot if she wins the tournament and Williams loses before the quarterfinals. Williams has a first-round bye and could get a second-round rematch with Svitolina, who opens the tournament against Christina McHale.The mens bracket is wide open because of a couple of injuries and travel challenges from the Olympics.Cincinnati has become Djokovics annual quest. Its the only one he needs to win in order to become the first get all nine current ATP Masters championships, something hed love to accomplish. He reached the finals last year and lost to Federer, who is 7-0 in title matches. By contrast, Djokovic is 0-5 in Cincinnati finals, never winning even a set.Djokovic dropped out because of a sore left wrist after he lost at the Olympics. Federer is taking the rest of the year off to rebuild a surgically repaired knee.Andy Murray enters the tournament as its top seed -- hes won it twice -- after winning the gold medal in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday night. He beat Juan Martin del Potro in a four-hour final that left him drained. He has little time to recover for Cincinnati.Emotionally, it was tough, Murray said of the four-hour set. Physically, it was hard.Rafael Nadal also will be making the trek after losing the bronze medal match on Sunday to Japans Kei Nishikori.Djokovic, Federer, Murray and Nadal have won 54 of the last 58 Masters events. Djokovic has won four of them this season, with Nadal and Murray winning one apiece. The injuries and the overlapping tournament schedules will open the way for someone else to reach the finals.Rain jumbled the last two days of qualifying, pushing many qualifying matches over to Sunday. They were again delayed by rain the morning and afternoon.---AP Tennis Writer Howard Fendrich in Rio de Janeiro contributed to this report.---Follow Joe Kay on Twitter: http://twitter.com/apjoekay Vapormax Plus Dame Danmark . 4 Villanova with a 96-68 drubbing on Monday. Wragge hit 9-of-14 from behind the arc, matching Kyle Korvers school record for 3-pointers in a game set in 2003, as Creighton (16-3, 6-1 Big East broke a conference record with 21 treys in the rout. Vapormax Sort Herre Danmark . Vancouver Whitecaps and Toronto FC failed to make the postseason while Montreal Impact fell at the first hurdle losing heavily to Houston Dynamo in the Eastern Conference Knockout Round. http://www.vapormaxdanmark.com/vapormax-herre-sko-danmark.html . The return match will take place next Wednesday. Udinese leads Fiorentina 2-1 in the other semifinal. Napoli staged a second-half comeback from two goals down after Gervinhos opener and a stunning strike from Kevin Strootman. Vapormax Danmark Online .com) - The women will also have a new champion at the Australian Open. Vapormax Dame Tilbud Danmark . They had already blown a double-digit lead, fans were hitting the exits, and a long seven-game road trip waited at the end. Though it may not be immediately obvious, sports and literature have a lot in common. In both worlds, the infinitesimal has grand consequences. Coming up a yard short in sports has the same implications as being a word off in literature.Yes, the work is different, but the commitments to greatness are indistinguishable from one another.Its important, then, that there are people who dedicate themselves to ensuring that the devotion is valued. The greatness, celebrated.In the same way former NBA commissioner David Stern understood that fans who watched basketball were as important to the games popularity as the athletes who played, National Book Foundation executive director Lisa Lucas is working around the clock so that we understand literature is about more than just the people who write, edit, publish, market and sell books; theyre about us -- the people who are, and should be, reading them.Similar to the excitement and fanfare Stern drummed up for the NBA, Lucas is looking to bring a similar excitement to the world of literature by making noise for the National Book Awards, an annual literary award show that celebrates the best of American literature, where those who spend countless hours honing their skills in the dark can be brought to the spotlight, and where even the biggest skeptics can be converted into believers.Great writing can be subjective, but Lucass objective is clear. Elevating the game means thinking about it differently, reckoning with the potential whats to be gained and expanding the ideas of whats possible. And because the smallest things make a worlds difference, the biggest changes are subtle; creating a gradual influence that eventually changes everything. I think about the 1992 Dream Team when I write this.About how many generations of kids, home and abroad, male and female, were emboldened to give their life to a sport that couldve ultimately been regarded as just a game had Stern not opted to allow NBA players to represent the United States in the Olympics instead of college players, which was standard practice at the time.Sterns decision to showcase athletes at the highest level was him understanding that your best foot forward kept you a step ahead. It also makes people want follow your lead.It is not my or anyone elses place to say, This isnt for you, Lucas tells me at her Wall Street office. The statement had come in the midst of a conversation about the direction of the foundation, where its going, where she plans to take it. Serving as its third president and being the first woman and black woman to head the organization, theres an understandable pressure to say what people may expect, or want to hear. Lucas sidesteps the expectations of others by staying true to what brought her to the foundation in the first place: the experience of the reader.If you think youre going to get a specific answer as to what kind of reader Lucas has in mind, youre not. A deeply cherished conviction of hers is that any and every one is a potential reader. The question then becomes: Well, how do you find them? A question Luccas answers with her and her staffs -- team of eight -- incessant travels around the country, visiting various literary festivals, speaking at libraries, participating in numerous panels; anything that drives the point home that theyre serious in meeting potential readers where they are, letting readers know that, even if they not sure about crossing the threshold, the door is always open.ddddddddddddThis means finding different ways to engage.Theres a different energy Lisa brings with her, director of programs Benjamin Samuels says, her presence alone gets people excited.By this time, weve moved to the room next door to her office where she and the foundations staff are preparing the invites for this years National Book Awards. Besides the awards being the organizations biggest event, its also one, if not the, most premier event in literature -- and Lucas has treated it as such.To build buzz for the awards, Lucas partnered up with The New Yorker to announce the finalist for each of the awards four categories -- young peoples literature, poetry, non-fiction and fiction -- on Facebook Live. Nearly 60,000 people watched the live broadcast, which is by no means a small number, but to see the moon, like Lucas wants to do, you have to be willing to look beyond the stars. Her unconventional approach is what landed actor and comedian Larry Wilmore as the host for this years award ceremony and dinner.There are plenty people with big voices, talking about books all the time, Lucas says while sorting and signing award invitations, and we want them at the table.I think about Lucass comment about bringing more people to the table in context to a few things: who her favorite athletes are (LeBron James, Serena and Venus Williams -- any athlete thats using their platform to bring awareness to social and political issues), her position as the executive director of National Book Foundation and what it may represent to people beyond the literary world.And the album thats playing in the background, Solanges A Seat at the Table, a record documenting what it means to grapple with your own inner glory even as the world fights you. What Lucas shares with her favorite athletes is the willingness to use her position to fight for a bigger table with more seats, one where everyone can sit.As Solanges album continues to play beneath our conversation, Lucas exclaims that in addition to LeBron, and the Williams sisters, shes also a huge fan of the entire WNBA.When I ask her why, Because were [the foundation] are a lot like them, she says. I remember when the WNBA first started, everyone said they wouldnt last longer than two years. But just like great literature, look: Theyre still here.?Yahdon Israel writes about race, class, gender and culture in American society. He has written for Avidly, The New Inquiry, Guernica and LitHub. He runs a popular Instagram page, which promotes literary culture as style with the hashtag #literaryswag. ' ' '