Serena Williams

Serena Williams is the greatest player in the history of tennis, both in terms of her record and her status as a world star whose influence extends far beyond tennis. She won 10 of her 23 Grand Slam titles with Patrick Mouratoglou as her coach between 2012 and 2017.

With Patrick Mouratoglou, she has experiencedone of the greatest success stories in modern tennis. Although the American had already won 13 major tournaments by the age of 30, The Coach was able to show her that she was an under-achiever, someone who was under-performing compared to her potential. Serena and Patrick began a major chapter in their respective careers.

A precocious phenomenon, the American, younger sister of another phenomenon, Venus Williams, played her first match on the WTA Tour at just 16, in 1997, and finished the season in the Top 100 (99th). She confirmed this in 1998 by breaking into the Top 20, and won the first tournament of her career the following year at the Open Gaz de France.
 

Serena Williams won her first Grand Slam title that year, in front of her home crowd at the US Open , beating world number one Martina Hingis in the final. Her dominance of the WTA Tour began three years later, in 2002. The Saginaw native won three Grand Slam tournaments, at Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open, beating Venus in each final. She became world number one for the first time in her career on 8 July 2002.

In 2003, Serena Williams won the Australian Open for the first time in her career. It was the first time since Steffi Graf in the 1993-1994 seasons that a player had won all four Grand Slam tournaments in succession.

In 2009, she enjoyed one of the best seasons of her career, winning two Grand Slam titles (Australian Open and Wimbledon) and the WTA Finals. She finished the year as world number one in singles and doubles, becoming the first player to achieve this feat since Martina Hingis in 1999.

Serena then decided to work with Patrick Mouratoglou, with whom she relaunched her career. Together, they won ten Grand Slam tournaments from Wimbledon 2012 onwards, their first tournament together. Her last title came at the Australian Open in 2017, her 23rd, when she was two months pregnant.

Serena Williams retired from Flushing Meadows in 2022 after losing in the third round to Ajla Tomljanovic. She ended her career with 39 Grand Slam titles, 23 in singles, 14 in doubles and two in mixed doubles, 73 WTA Tour titles in singles, an Olympic gold medal in singles in London and three in doubles (Sydney, London and Rio) with her sister Venus.

Junior honours: Pro from the start!

Like her sister Venus, Serena Williams skipped the junior stage and started making a name for herself on the pro circuit at the age of 16 in 1997, when she won her first match.

WTA honours list: A women’s tennis legend

Serena Williams is the fifth most successful player in the Open era. She has won 73 singles titles, including 23 Grand Slam titles (the Open era record ahead of Steffi Graf’s 22) and 5 Masters titles. She has also lost 25 finals on the WTA Tour. Serena has won at least one title in 14 seasons of her career. The youngest of the Williams sisters has 858 victories, including 177 against players in the Top 10. She has beaten a world number one 17 times.

Serena Williams began playing tennis at the age of 5, coached by her father Richard on the courts of Compton, California. Her childhood is recounted in the film The Williams Method, released in 2021. The American married Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of the social network Reddit, in 2017. Together they had two children, Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr and Adira River Ohanian. In 2018, Serena Williams launched her own ready-to-wear brand called Serena. In 2024, she also launched her line of beauty products, WYN Beauty. She also owns a joint venture that invests in a number of businesses in the United States.