NESTOR AWARDED ORDER OF CANADA

He's already Canada's most decorated tennis player with six Grand Slam doubles titles and an Olympic gold medal among his accomplishments.

But at age 38, Daniel Nestor shows no signs of slowing down.

"I feel like I keep doing certain things better, understanding things more and finding out more things about myself," the Toronto left-hander said this week as he prepares for his first tournament of the season. "For sure I'm a late bloomer."

Nestor's impressive career earned him another accolade this week when he was appointed to the Order of Canada, joining many other top Canadian athletes.

MONO HIT FED, RODDICK, STEPANEK

World No. 8 Andy Roddick says he feels at full strength for the first time in more than six months after overcoming the strength-sapping illness mononucleosis.

Roddick said he fought the illness for most of this past year, when he failed to reach the quarterfinals at Wimbledon and the French and U.S. Opens.

He said Wednesday he had worked hard to regain his fitness during the recent offseason and is looking toward next week’s Brisbane Invitational as a springboard into a better 2011.

“For me it’s just a matter of getting right, getting healthy,” Roddick said. “I battled sickness for a big part of last year and from there I just felt like I was playing catch-up.

“You train hard and you get hurt in training coming back. You don’t train, you rest and you try and come back and your body is not right and it shows.

A former No. 1, Roddick’s ranking dropped as low as 13 in August before climbing back into the top 10. He says he feels ready to again crack the world’s top five.

The Czech player has dropped to No. 62 in the South African Airways ATP Rankings after suffering a bout of mononucleosis in the middle part of 2010, but posted encouraging results in the final six weeks of the season and said on Friday that he is feeling fit again ahead of the new year.

Read more: http://www.sunherald.com/2010/12/29/2741131/tennis-roddick-on-the-mend-after.html#ixzz19bs5TX4G

2011 ATP CALENDAR

1.2 January

1.3 February

1.4 March

1.5 April

1.6 May

1.7 June

1.8 July

1.9 August

1.10 September

1.11 October

1.12 November

SAMPRAS TROPIES STOLEN

Tennis star Pete Sampras says most of his trophies and other memorabilia were stolen from a West Los Angeles public storage facility.

The Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday that Sampras still has 13 of his 14 grand slam trophies.

But thieves took most of the hardware from his 64 tour title wins, two Davis Cups, an Olympic ring and six trophies for finishing world No. 1 in the year-end rankings from 1993 to 1998.

The theft happened three weeks ago. Sampras says he’s getting the word out in hopes somebody offers a lead.

Sampras retired in 2003 and said the loss is most upsetting because he would have liked to have shown the trophies to his children.

He says the loss “is like having the history of my tennis life taken away.”

Information from: Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com

DELPO RETURNS

U.S. Open winner Juan Martin Del Potro of Argentina will make his comeback from a 12-month injury layoff at the Sydney International in January after being handed a wild card into the tournament.

Del Potro has been out of action since last year's Australian Open with a wrist injury, dropping from 4 to 259 on the men's world rankings. The wild card will allow him to join a field for the Jan. 9-15 tournament which includes Cypriot Marcos Baghdatis and American Sam Querrey.

Organizers confirmed Wednesday that seven of the world's top 10 women will take part in the Australian Open warm-up event at Sydney Olympic Park.

AP