Chapter 1207 Wind Signs
The casinos in Monte Carlo, the marriage of Princess Grace, the gathering of wealthy and famous people, everything makes Monaco mysterious.
In addition, there is the Monte Carlo Opera House, built in 1879, which is still one of the top music halls in Europe; and the Monte Carlo International Circus Festival is also world-renowned, continuing this traditional art form that is almost extinct and attracting a large number of tourists every year.
For various reasons, this country with a tiny area is infinitely attractive, but "attractiveness" is attractiveness, which does not seem to be enough for people to choose to settle here, nor is it enough to explain the astonishing population density. So, what is the core reason?
The answer is——
There is no personal income tax.
Because Monaco has no personal income tax system, it attracts a considerable number of wealthy tax-avoiding immigrants, mainly from other European countries.
There are businessmen, actors, professional players... and so on.
In fact, most of the wealthy people who actually settle in Monaco are businessmen with businesses all over the world. They are the protagonists of this paradise; but to the general public, the names of those businessmen are completely unfamiliar and lack impact. They are still paying attention to those celebrities.
Especially professional players with high incomes, such as F1 drivers, professional football players, and so on.
In people's impression, F1 drivers generally live in Monte Carlo, but is this really the case? The Times once did an interesting statistics.
Strictly speaking, it is not a complete statistics, nor a sampling statistics, but based on impressions, forty-nine known and confirmed professional players who have settled in Monte Carlo were selected, each of whom is a familiar name, and then their careers were statistically analyzed.
The answer was a little surprising.
Ranked first is tennis, with 27 people; ranked second is F1 racing drivers, with 7 people. The other 15 people belong to a variety of different projects, including skiing, equestrianism, cycling, golf, boxing, etc.
The numbers are in stark contrast.
As one of the highest-earning individual sports in the world, tennis players' tournament prize money and sponsorship income undoubtedly always ranks among the top.
To some extent, they do urgently need a "paradise" like Monte Carlo; what's more, compared to another tax haven, the Bahamas, Monte Carlo has convenient transportation and mature training grounds, which is undoubtedly more friendly to tennis players and allows them to enjoy both life and training.
Djokovic currently lives in Monte Carlo.
Later, players such as Medvedev, Zverev, Tsitsipas, Berrettini, Auger-Aliassime, Hurkacz, Wawrinka, Cilic and others also settled here.
Oh, and this is also where Dimitrov’s official residence is, although he now spends most of his time in Miami.
By the way, Nadal lives in Spain, Federer lives in Switzerland, and Murray lives in the UK.
Of course, the above is still not all.
In addition to the casino, rose garden, royal palace, ocean park, etc., Monte Carlo also has two important events that attract the world's attention.
One is the F1 Grand Prix.
The Monaco Grand Prix is the oldest of all F1 events. Since the F1 Grand Prix landed in Monte Carlo in 1950, it has never left here. For more than half a century, it has witnessed countless classics, because -
The city streets are the track for the F1 Grand Prix.
Here, there is only a very limited section of the spectator stands, and city residents are very proud to say that they watched the game standing on their own balconies.
Normally, this is a street, and only during official competitions are protective walls added to form a temporary track.
It is for this reason that the track has remained virtually unchanged since 1950, yet remains one of the most difficult and dangerous tracks in F1, a challenge for every driver.
Because of its long history, special track and great difficulty, this race is known as the "Crown Jewel". Every racer is eager to reach the top and win the championship here, otherwise his championship puzzle will never seem complete.
The second is the Tennis Masters.
If we talk about the Monte Carlo Masters, it was founded in 1987; but in fact, after the establishment of the country club in 1897, the event has been held here.
The tournament is held only six years later than the French Open, and is even older than the Australian Open among the four Grand Slams.
From Laver to Bjorn Borg, to Becker, Muster, and then to Kuerten and Ferrero, countless clay court masters have reached the top here.
Moreover, the fundamental reason why the Monte Carlo Masters has such a special historical status still requires discussing the particularity of clay.
The structure and characteristics of red soil itself determine that the effects of weather, altitude, humidity, etc. are very direct and significant.
On the same court, when playing in sunny and dry weather, the ball speed is relatively faster and bounces higher; when playing in cloudy and humid weather, the ball speed is relatively slower and bounces lower; moreover, there are obvious differences in ball speed and bounce between indoors and outdoors. Environmental factors always exist objectively.
In addition, generally speaking, the higher the altitude, the lower the bounce and the faster the speed; the lower the altitude, the higher the bounce and the slower the speed.
Of course, this is not absolute, as factors such as clay material, weather conditions, tennis brand, etc. need to be considered, but overall, the trend is indeed like this.
Looking at several major events in the clay court season, based on the speed of the ball and the bounce, they are arranged from fast to slow and from low to high in the following order: Madrid, Rome, Barcelona, Monte Carlo.
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Simply put, Madrid has the fastest ball speed and Monte Carlo has the slowest; Madrid has the lowest bounce and Monte Carlo has the highest bounce.
In fact, this is not unfamiliar.
Hard courts can be divided into fast and slow courts. The Australian Open is a slow hard court, and the US Open is a fast hard court. The same is true for clay courts. Madrid is a fast clay court, and Monte Carlo is a slow clay court. In addition, traditional clay courts are slow, while green clay and blue clay courts are getting faster and faster, and the bounce is getting higher and higher.
Taking the "King of Clay" Nadal as the standard, we can see that there are obvious differences among these clay courts.
For Nadal, it is obvious that the higher the bounce, the better, and the slower the ball speed is not necessarily better, but overall, the ball speed on clay should not be too fast.
Therefore, the difference can be seen from the number of times Nadal has won the above four events. Excluding the impact of injuries, these differences exist objectively: Madrid, five times.
Rome, ten times.
Barcelona, twelve times.
Monte Carlo, eleven times.
In other words, although it is also red clay, it is different. The difference is even more obvious than that between hard court and grass, and the impact of weather and environment is more direct.
Even the "King of Clay" Nadal has different conditions and performances on different courts in the same season.
It is precisely because of this that Monte Carlo’s special status is highlighted——
Because the competition environment, weather conditions and clay properties of Monte Carlo are most similar to those of Paris, it is known as the weather vane of the French Open.
At the same time, Monte Carlo is also the most important and unmissable stop in the French Open warm-up tournament, and the venue is the best place to adapt to training matches.
(End of this chapter)