WITH Wimbledon having awarded equal prize-money to their men's and women's singles champions since 2007, eyebrows might be raised at the winning pay cheques at next week's Aegon British Tour event at Ilkley.

While the men's winner receives a whopping £1,500 – normal Tier One is £600 and even normal Premier Tier is only £1,000 – the women's winner will only take home £200.

However, there are reasons for the disparity in a competition that normally pays the same for the men's and women's winners.

The men's event at Ilkley has been categorised as Tier One with enhanced prize-money which has been provided by the host club, while the women's event is Tier Two with regular prize-money.

Another reason for the difference is that the women's singles at Ilkley is competing against a $25,000 ITF Aegon GB Pro-Series event at Foxhills, Woking and also the qualifying for a $25,000 event at Chiswick in the first weekend in August, while the men's event is the most important in Great Britain next week.

The LTA have also promised to stage nothing higher than a Tier Two Aegon British Tour event in the same week as an Aegon GB Pro-Series tournament.

Ilkley Lawn Tennis & Squash Club's general manager Charlie Maunder said: "There would be no point in boosting the women's prize-money when we would only have been getting the same players."

Incidentally, the Aegon British Tour event at Sutton on August 13-19, which is a Premier Tier category, also has enhanced prize-money from the host club and offers £2,000 to the winners, plus a wild card into the end-of-season Aegon British Tour Masters.

The men's singles draw at Ilkley includes seven players with a 1.1 rating, including Tour leader Sean Hodkin (Lincolnshire) and Yorkshire's Luke Johnson and Clay Crawford, who is from Leeds.

Summer Yardley (Warwickshire) and Olivia Peet (Lancashire), who are among eight 2.1 ratings in the women's singles, are in the top three of their tour standings.

Leading Yorkshire hopefuls are Ilkley member Isabelle Hearnshaw and Holly Horsfall, from Hepworth, near Holmfirth.

Qualifying for both singles starts next Tuesday, with the main draws beginning next Thursday.

The women's final is a week on Saturday, alongside the men's quarter and semi-finals, and the men's final a week on Sunday (tentatively 1pm).

Running alongside the British Tour is the Ilkley Open, which includes junior, senior and handicap events.