American and Canadian Women to Watch on the WTA Tour for 2011 - Krista Hardebeck

The tennis calendar has turned to a new year. Another year of players hopping from continent to continent, tournament to tournament, trying to reach their goals and live up to lofty expectations. While some players are hanging on to their career, hoping for wildcards and playing their way through qualifying events, there is a whole new crop of players from North America that have been working for years, inching their way up the rankings with hopes of making a huge breakthrough, and becoming one of the elite players in the world. The WTA Tour is stacked with young players looking to make that breakthrough in 2011. Some are on the cusp, some are still a year or two away. In a multi-part series, we'll look one by one at some of the "young guns" of the WTA Tour from Canada and the United States. Let's see who is poised to make that move in 2011.

Krista Hardebeck

All of a sudden, 17-year old Californian Krista Hardebeck is now showing up on the radar for those looking at the future of American tennis.

Now with a ranking of #393, and a whole year ahead of her to improve that ranking, Krista could break the top 200 in no time.

The righthander is not an overpowering player, she uses her quick feet and flexible body to hot deep angles groundstrokes and is patient waiting for her opportunity to finish off points. Krista told me she needs to improve her serve to compete with the big hitting girls and move forward on points to show she is being aggressive.

She will play mainly ITF events in 2011, and she is currently making her way through the main draw of a 25K event in Rancho Santa Fe, CA.

She has career wins over top-200 players Yurika Sema of Japan and American Julia Cohen. Krista really made people take notice when she outlasted a player with a rising ranking in Irina Falconi at the USTA Australian Open Wildcard Playoffs back in December.

Remember the name Krista Hardebeck.  She should make another big move in 2011, and she might be ready for a top 100 breakthrough in 2012.