The Australian Open 2010 Preview

It's that time again, the Indy 500 of races, the Grand Slam of baseball, the Asia/Pacific's only...the 'Australian Open!'
However, regardless of this being a time of excitement for our friends down-under, let's take a moment to remember our friends in Haiti just like many of the contenders in the Australian Open did with 'Hit for Haiti' on Sunday.
Tennis stars including: Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Andy Roddick, Serena Williams, Kim Clijsters, Lleyton Hewitt, Samantha Stosur, Novak Djokovic, Bernard Tomic, and special guest chair umpire Jim Courier all took time out to 'play for pay,' raising according to ESPN2 almost $500,000 for Haiti earthquake survivors. What a way to start something off like the Austalian Open! These players risked injury that would affect their playing in the Australian Open and played for charity....God bless them.
Now, getting back to the game, there are several men vying for a championship here. Roger Federer is hungry for another win, but he'll have to beat out Rafael Nadal to do so.
Others in the men's category like Juan Martin del Potro won a slam with the U.S. Open and he did it on a hard court like the one here at the Australian Open.
Let's not forget the underdogs like: Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray, Andy Roddick, and Jo-Wilfred Tsonga, who all believe they have a shot.
On the women's side, we can't forget the William's sisters...strong contenders, but they'll have to get past two other threats, namely Kim Clijsters who just came out of retirement and Justine Henin who's also fresh out of retirement and wants to continue being the 'best female tennis player in the world.'
All-in-all, this should turn out to be an interesting 2010 Australian Open, and if you'd like, you can follow many of the players on the official Australian Open tweeter site: http://www.australianopen.com/en_AU/twitter/index.html.