Tennis Star Maria Sharapova

Biography

Maria Sharapova was born on April 19th, 1987 to parents Yuri and Yelena in Nyagan, a town in western Siberia into a loving but poor Russian family. She is the only child to her parents who always supported her to live up to her dreams and guide her to become a well known tennis star in the world. She is a dazzling player and authoritatively rules the court with her sound tennis playing strategy and has won several big titles to her name including Wimbledon Championship.

Earlier her parents had fled from Belarus to avoid radiation from Chernobyl, but still the home was near to the disaster site, they left their home as refugees again when she was two years old and settled in Black Sea town of Sochi, known then as a resort village in a home of Russian tennis light, Yevgeny Kafelnikov. It was during her fourth birthday, Kafelnikov presented her one of the old Dunlop tennis racquets of his son. Although she was encouraged to every field including dancing and music to athletics by her parents, when that old racquet falls on her hand, she never stop hitting the balls against the side of the house; this is how her career in tennis started as she grew up and at the age of 18, she became the world's highest paid female athlete.

Tennis Career She started to play tennis at the age of four, and by the time when was six her coach suggested her parents to take her to Moscow to be enrolled in Russian Tennis Federation. There she showed her talent and won the heart of head coach Yuri Udkin. It was her luck that she meet famous tennis star Martina Navratilova in a local exhibition, who again recommended her parents to take her to the Nick Bollettieri tennis academy in Florida.   Her parents through not sound financially somehow managed to take her to Florida where Bollettieri accepted her and she started to continue her education in same tennis school that had produced renowned tennis players like Andre Agassi, Monica Seles, Mary Pierce and Jim Courier. Due to some visa problem, her mother could not join them and father and daughter struggled hard in Florida, father Yuri though an engineer back home, took up odd jobs like maintaining the greens at a local golf course and waiter in America to support and be near his daughter.

 

Earlier Yuri had to pay for her education, but as she grew up started excelling in sports holding number 15 among others of her age, Bollettieri offered a glimpse of Maria to executives at International Management Group (IMG), they were stunned by her talent and immediately enrolled on full scholarship. Then life became much easier for both daughter and father, and she worked hard to take advantage of all those opportunities.

But success does not come easy to her credit, Russian rivals bad-mouthed her regularly, she went under hard training regimen, video cameras recorded her every move during her practice sessions to examine her behavior and form, but she worked hard and spend time with her coaches and examine everything and sorted out her shortcomings and work on them to bring positive emotions and attitude to her game. By the age of 11, she was busy managing her time between home, IMG, and the Los Angeles courts of Robert Lansdorp, her primary coach.

Again in the year 2000, she made a sensational win against Myriam Casanova (7-6 (8-6), 6-4) and bagged the Girls 16s of the Eddie Herr International Junior Tennis Championships.

In 2001, at the age of 14, she made her debut at an ITF event held at Sarasota. Looking at her talents, people started comparing her with ace players like Monika Seles. In the same year, she rose up to the final of Australian Open juniors and she was the youngest finalist in the tournament’s history.

 

As Maria worked hard to her dream game, success came flooding her way and she successively ascended in World Tennis Association (WTA) ranking defeating other champions and winning some elite tennis tournaments. She was ranked 186th on the WTA charts during 2002. But by 2003, she rose to number 34 and win two professional titles at Quebec City and the Japan Open and two double titles with fellow player Tamarine Tanasugarn at Luxembourg and the Japan Open. She was overjoyed when she won Wimbledon (2004) at the age of 17 and she became the first Russian to claim Wimbledon championship title at the All England club in London defeating Serena Williams (6- 1, 6-4) and second youngest champion since Martina Hingis took the title in 1997 aged 16.

 

After winning the title she said to British Broadcasting Corp.” It’s just amazing,” “Serena, I'm sorry to have to take this from you for one year. I am sure there will be many more moments to come when we will be fighting it out for a trophy.”

With her stunning potential to smash the balls on the court, this 6ft tall blonde is equally beautiful with attractive sporty feature. She was endorsed as brand ambassador for many products like Motorola, Canon and Honda, Colgate-Palmolive, Nike, Prince, Microsoft, Pepsi, NEC, NEC,and TAG Heuer and also gained modeling contract with IMG Models. All such off-court stuff further trigger her bank balance and she became the highest paid female athlete in the world with annual endorsement cost amounting to $22.5 million.

 

Maria Sharapova is very hard working and talented athlete who never plays only for money but solely plays to win and become a champion. Her enthusiasm, commitment, and inclination towards game are what make her so appealing to the world.

Her parents are very supportive to her ever since her childhood and cherish to see her shinning bright among other stars. Maria is really indebted to her parents who helped her to realize her dream and reach the plethora of success in Tennis. When she won the Wimbledon title, she thanked her parents Yuri and Yelena by presenting a BMW each.

Recently in a voting held by American Academy of Cosmetic Dentistry, she gathered 42% vote and was chosen as the female athlete with the best smile. She made a multi year deal with land Rover, which further added sweetness to Maria’s smile making her richer by few more millions. She was named the world’s richest female athlete by Forbes for the year 2005.