LONDON, June 23 (Reuters) - The longest match tennis has ever seen between American John Isner and Franceâs Nicolas Mahut was halted at 59-59 in the fifth set after an astonishing ten hours when bad light halted play on Wednesday. The previous record of six hours 33 minutes was set when Fabrice Santoro beat Arnaud Clement at the French Open in 2004. http://sports.yahoo.com/tennis/news?slug=reu-wimbledonlongest_urgent_pix_tv Ten hours. WOW.
Mahut came through qualifying, winning one match 24-22 in the fifth. http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tomfordyce/2010/06/maraat.html The sad thing is that who ever wins this one is guaranteed to lose in the second round due to exhaustion.
It's similar to a baseball game that goes 25+ innings and each team is forced to use all their pitchers which, essentially, screws up their rotations for the next several games at least. Even if you win, you still lose.