American Taylor Townsend upset No. 20 Maja Chwalinska 6-2, 6-3, and did it wearing a fit of her own design: red, white and black with a mesh top and tassels around the waist.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is the first time I\u2019ve ever done anything like this. This is something that I wanted to do from the beginning when I first came and created my own brand,\u201d said Townsend. \u201cBut it\u2019s really, really difficult, and you have to find people that are able to do that and turn things around in tennis.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of people don\u2019t realize that with tennis, as soon as one [tournament] is over, you should always be working on the next thing because it\u2019s a really fast overturn. We\u2019re playing this and then in two weeks it\u2019s the Asia Swing. \u2026 So it\u2019s really fast if you wanna show up differently for every tournament or every swing. So, credit to them. They really did phenomenal with being able to bring these looks to life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Taylor Townsend of the United States celebrates after winning her match against Maja Chwalinska of Poland during the first round of the U.S. Open tennis championships on Monday, Aug. 31, 2026, in New York. AP Photo\/Yuki Iwamura<\/p>\n
Townsend \u2014 who has five outfits lined up through the U.S. Open \u2014 has long been a fan favorite in New York and hosted what she called a \u201cwelcome to the U.S. Open\u201d party. She often explores the city, and even rode her first Citi Bike, but doesn\u2019t have a routine that she keeps when she comes to town.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo. I don\u2019t think anyone in New York has a routine, if I\u2019m being honest,\u201d Townsend laughed. \u201cIt\u2019s like, \u2018We\u2019re just gonna do this or that. I like this spot, but I\u2019m here, I\u2019ve got to go there.\u2019 I did have a chopped cheese for the first time. It was delicious. Yeah, I did a Citi Bike \u2014 that was fun. I was so scared, but then when I got the hang of it, I was like, \u2018Oh, this is fun.\u2019 So that was great.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just feel like it\u2019s so hard because our schedules are all over the place. So it\u2019s really difficult to have anything [planned]. We ordered from a restaurant that we really liked. \u2026 We ordered Philippe Chow and we really like that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Townsend faces wild card Taylah Preston in the second round.<\/p>\n
Taylor Townsend attends her event 40 Love: A Night With Taylor Townsend at Sei Less on Friday, August 28, 2026, in New York City. Getty Images<\/p>\n
Iga Swiatek\u2019s first-round dominance in Flushing continues.<\/p>\n
The No. 8-seed won her eighth straight first-round match at the U.S. Open \u2014 and her eighth straight in straight sets, topping China\u2019s Wang Xiyu in straight sets Monday night.<\/p>\n
She also became the first player to record 28-plus consecutive opening match wins at Grand Slam events since Serena Williams.<\/p>\n
Iga Swiatek, of Poland, returns the ball to Wang Xiyu, of China, during the first round of the U.S. Open tennis championships Monday, August 31, 2026, in New York. AP Photo\/Frank Franklin II<\/p>\n
Only three players this century \u2014 Serena Williams (28), Venus Williams (28) and Kim Clijsters (30) \u2014 have 25 career wins in the U.S. Open in fewer matches than Swiatek (31).<\/p>\n
A serious contender for this year\u2019s trophy, Swiatek is looking to add to her 2022 U.S. Open title after bowing out in the quarterfinal the last two years.<\/p>\n
Matteo Berrettini swept Stan Wawrinka aside 7-6 (4), 7-6 (3), 6-0 on Grandstand.<\/p>\n
Filipina phenom Alexandra Eala is set to take the U.S. Open by storm and bring her huge following to Flushing. After packing fans on Grandstand a year ago, she\u2019ll play her first-round match Tuesday night vs. American qualifier Mary Stoiana.<\/p>\n
Eala, 21, blew past a million followers on Instagram after her breakout run in the Miami Open \u2014 where she beat Keys and Swiatek \u2014 and she\u2019s doubled that coming into Flushing. There will surely be tons of Filipino flags waving in the stands.<\/p>\n
After being eliminated from the singles draw in the wee hours of Monday, Venus Williams still has doubles later this week with younger sister Serena. But the elder Williams hasn\u2019t planned out her future past that match and says she shouldn\u2019t need to.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think I should have to,\u201d Williams told a tiny group of reporters in front of her locker room early Monday. \u201cMy mind is fully focused on that [doubles match], how I recover from this completely insane evening and get ready for the next one.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Williamses will play doubles either Thursday or Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"American Taylor Townsend upset No. 20 Maja Chwalinska 6-2, 6-3, and did it wearing a fit of her…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":334493,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[26675,9,24,55,54,56,319,99518,15547,24822],"class_list":["post-334492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-citi-bike","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-sports","tag-taylor-townsend","tag-tennis","tag-us-open-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=334492"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/334492\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/334493"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=334492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=334492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=334492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}