Following Elena Dementieva By Remote Control

Elena Dementieva and I have never met. We’ve been just feet apart, at the Pilot Pen Tennis Tournament in New Haven. I had just gotten my Canon and was anxious to take some sports photos. I had a press pass already, so what the heck!

Elena is strikingly blond and tall and lean. You catch a glimpse of whatever it is that passes for underwear as her tennis outfit rides up while she lunges after shots.

I was very pleased with the shots I took and put them in my photo gallery. They sat there until Google started crawling through, finding my pictures and their captions. All of a sudden I was on the first page of Google’s images results! In fact, my shot is now on the top line.

Whenever Elena does well, I do well. I woke up this (late) morning to find nearly 2,000 page reads on my site. That’s more than I usually get in a full day – certainly many more than I expect to see on the 4th of July.

I didn’t have to think twice. I knew she had to be in late contention in a tennis tournament. In this case it was Wimbledon. Elena made the round of 8 before being defeated by Maria Sharapova.

By tomorrow, my Elena Dementieva traffic will be gone, only to reappear when she gets hot the next time. Meanwhile, that one photo of mine has been seen 29,000 times! I can’t even imagine what would happen to this site if she won a major.

2 thoughts on “Following Elena Dementieva By Remote Control”

  1. Geoff–amazing photos–what model Canon are you using? Have you done photography professionally? Degree or self-taught? Evi/Danbury

  2. You’re sweet to say that, but they’re pretty pedestrian. You should see how the pros do it.

    I use a Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Those shots were on a tripod, ISO 100, F16, shooting anywhere from 1 to 10 seconds.

    All the best,

    Geoff Fox

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