Julian Knowle

Not to be confused with Julian Knowles.

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Julian Knowle

Country	Austria
Residence	Hard, Austria
Born	29 April 1974 (1974-04-29) Lauterach, Austria
Height	1.87 m (6 ft 2 in)
Weight	72 kg (160 lb)
Turned pro	1992
Plays	Left-handed (two-handed both sides)
Career prize money	$2,163,433
Singles
Career record	10–32
Career titles	0
Highest ranking	No. 86 (5 July 2002)
Grand Slam results
Australian Open	2nd (2003)
French Open	1st (2002)
Wimbledon	3rd (2002)
US Open	1st (2002)
Doubles
Career record	272-238
Career titles	13
Highest ranking	No. 6 (7 January 2008)
Grand Slam Doubles results
Australian Open	3R (2006, 2007)
French Open	SF (2010)
Wimbledon	F (2004)
US Open	W (2007)
Grand Slam Mixed Doubles results
Australian Open	QF (2007)
French Open	F (2010)
Wimbledon	QF (2010)
US Open	2nd (2006, 2010)
Last updated on: 30 June 2011.

Julian Knowle (born 29 April 1974) is an Austrian male professional tennis player. Being a born left-hander Knowle is one of now only few on the ATP Tour who plays his forehand, backhand and even volleys double-handed. He is Austria's most successful doubles player in history by reaching no. 6 in the ATP doubles ranking in January 2008; this attribute he has to share now with Jürgen Melzer, who reached no. 6 in the ATP doubles ranking in September 2010.

Knowle was a successful player on the ATP Challenger Series, winning the Challenger tournaments in Kyoto (1999), Caracas (2001), Graz (2001) and Andrezieux (2002) and reaching the finals in Yokohama (2000), Bristol (2000), Besançon (2000) and Graz (2003). He also won several Futures tournaments. Knowle's best ATP singles ranking was no. 86 in July 2002. He appeared last in the main draw of a singles tournament in the Graz Challenger in 2005 where he reached the quarter final.

Knowle reached his first of two Grand Slam finals at Wimbledon in 2004 together with Nenad Zimonjić of Serbia. Eventually the team was defeated in four sets by Jonas Björkman and Todd Woodbridge. The only Austrian to reach a final at Wimbledon before was Georg von Metaxa in doubles in 1938 where he too lost.

In 2005 Knowle teamed up with Czech Petr Pála for several months without being able to continue his successful run with Zimonjić. This changed when he formed a team with fellow Austrian player and left-hander Jürgen Melzer, joining him throughout most of 2005 and 2006. Together they won two tournaments in doubles and reached another five finals.

Following Jürgen Melzer's hand injury in early 2007, Knowle found a new partner in Simon Aspelin of Sweden.

At the 2007 U.S. Open, seeded tenth with his partner Simon Aspelin, Knowle achieved the greatest triumph of his career by winning the U.S. Open, his first Grand Slam. In the first two rounds, they won over Kubot/Skoch 6–2 6–2 and got a walkover over Calleri/Horna. They went on to upset the eighth seeds Jonathan Erlich and Andy Ram (who would go on to win the 2008 Australian Open men's doubles) in the third round. In the quarterfinals, they shocked the top seeds Bob and Mike Bryan 7–5 6–4, having lost to them only weeks before. In the semifinals, they held off unseeded Julien Benneteau and Nicolas Mahut 7–6(2) 1–6 6–3, before winning the final 7–5 6–4 over the ninth seeds, Pavel Vízner and Lukáš Dlouhý. They had previously won three tournaments together. This win put them into the No. 5 position in the ATP Doubles Race, and also gave Knowle his first top 10 ranking in doubles.

Julian Knowle was the second of so far three Austrian tennis players to win a Grand Slam tournament (the first in doubles). The first Austrian to win a Grand Slam tournament was Thomas Muster at the 1995 French Open, the third one was Jürgen Melzer who won the 2010 Wimbledon Championships – Men's Doubles with his German partner Philipp Petzschner.

Their excellent first year as a team enabled Knowle and Aspelin to participate in the Tennis Masters Cup in Shanghai, China for the first time. They surprisingly made it all the way to the finals, beating Pavel Vízner and Lukáš Dlouhý, Arnaud Clément and Michaël Llodra and finally Martin Damm and Leander Paes before eventually falling in straight sets to Mark Knowles and Daniel Nestor 2–6, 3–6.

Their first Masters Cup participation put the duo into the no. 3 spot of the ATP Doubles Race for the first time.

In December 2007 Knowle suffered from acute hearing loss.

Knowle and Aspelin were not able to continue their successful 2007 run, reaching five semi-finals together in the 2008 season and reaching the 3rd round of the French Open as their best Grandslam result.

Together with Jürgen Melzer Knowle participated at the 2008 Olympic Games in China. They defeated the German duo of Nicolas Kiefer and Rainer Schüttler in three sets in the first round before being knocked out of the tournament by Bob and Mike Bryan of the USA 6-7(2), 4-6.

Starting early 2009 Knowle formed a team with fellow Austrian Jürgen Melzer once more though occasionally also teaming with other players. Knowle and Melzer enjoyed little success on the tour in the first half of 2009 before their performance increased significantly in the later weeks, winning titles in New Haven and Tokyo and reaching another final in Vienna. Unfortunately their success came too late in the year to qualify for the Masters Cup.

In 2010 Knowle played the first months of the year with Sweden's Robert Lindstedt. Together they reached Knowle's last doubles final to date in Marseille where they lost in straight sets. Due to little succes on the tour together Knowle and Lindstedt parted ways with Knowle teaming with Andy Ram from Israel. Their best performance would come at the French Open at Roland Garros where they surpringly reached the semi-finals.

Knowle's 2011 stint was plagued by numerous injuries. Following a groin injury he teamed up once more with Simon Aspelin but they had little success. A torn muscle fascicle in April ended their partnership, forcing Knowle to pause for six weeks. His planned return to the tour failed when a partially torn tendon prevented him to participate at the French Open and defend his semi-final success from the previous year.

ATP Career Finals

Doubles Titles: 29 (16-13)

Legend Grand Slam (1/1) Tennis Masters Cup (0/1) ATP Masters Series (0/0) ATP International Series Gold (1/2) ATP Tour (11/12)

Titles by Surface Hard (6/8) Clay (5/5) Grass (1/2) Carpet (1/1)

Outcome	No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partner	Opponents in the final	Score in the final
Winner	1.	18 February 2002	Copenhagen, Denmark	Hard (i)	Michael Kohlmann	Jiří Novák Radek Štěpánek	7–6(10–8), 7–5
Runner-up	1.	6 May 2002	Mallorca, Spain	Clay	Michael Kohlmann	Mahesh Bhupathi Leander Paes	2–6, 4–6
Winner	2.	22 July 2002	Umag, Croatia	Clay	František Čermák	Albert Portas Fernando Vicente	6–4, 6–4
Winner	3.	6 January 2003	Chennai, India	Hard	Michael Kohlmann	František Čermák Leoš Friedl	7–6(7–1), 7–6(7–3)
Runner-up	2.	3 March 2003	Copenhagen, Denmark	Hard (i)	Michael Kohlmann	Tomáš Cibulec Pavel Vízner	5–7, 7–5, 2–6
Runner-up	3.	14 July 2003	Newport, United States	Grass	Jürgen Melzer	Jordan Kerr David Macpherson	6–7(4–7), 3–6
Winner	4.	27 October 2003	St. Petersburg, Russia	Hard (i)	Nenad Zimonjić	Michael Kohlmann Rainer Schüttler	7–6(7–1), 6–3
Runner-up	4.	3 May 2004	Munich, Germany	Clay	Nenad Zimonjić	James Blake Mark Merklein	2–6, 4–6
Runner-up	5.	5 July 2004	London, Great Britain	Grass	Nenad Zimonjić	Jonas Björkman Todd Woodbridge	1–6, 4–6, 6–4, 4–6
Winner	5.	2 May 2005	Munich, Germany	Clay	Mario Ančić	Florian Mayer Alexander Waske	6–3, 1–6, 6–3
Winner	6.	31 October 2005	St. Petersburg, Russia	Carpet	Jürgen Melzer	Jonas Björkman Max Mirnyi	4–6, 7–5, 7–5
Runner-up	6.	17 April 2006	Houston, United States	Clay	Jürgen Melzer	Michael Kohlmann Alexander Waske	7–5, 4–6, [5–10]
Winner	7.	1 May 2006	Casablanca, Morocco	Clay	Jürgen Melzer	Michael Kohlmann Alexander Waske	6–3, 6–4
Runner-up	7.	9 October 2006	Metz, France	Hard (i)	Jürgen Melzer	Richard Gasquet Fabrice Santoro	6–3, 1-6, [9–11]
Runner-up	8.	16 October 2006	Vienna, Austria	Hard (i)	Jürgen Melzer	Petr Pála Pavel Vízner	4–6, 6–3, [10–12]
Runner-up	9.	30 October 2006	St. Petersburg, Russia	Carpet	Jürgen Melzer	Simon Aspelin Todd Perry	1–6, 6–7(3–7)
Runner-up	10.	26 February 2007	Memphis, United States	Hard (i)	Jürgen Melzer	Eric Butorac Jamie Murray	5–7, 3–6
Winner	8.	28 May 2007	Pörtschach, Austria	Clay	Simon Aspelin	Leoš Friedl David Škoch	7–6(8–6), 5–7, [10–5]
Winner	9.	17 June 2007	Halle, Germany	Grass	Simon Aspelin	Fabrice Santoro Nenad Zimonjić	6–4, 7–6(7–5)
Winner	10.	15 July 2007	Båstad, Sweden	Clay	Simon Aspelin	Martín García Sebastián Prieto	6–2, 6–4
Winner	11.	7 September 2007	New York, United States	Hard	Simon Aspelin	Lukáš Dlouhý Pavel Vízner	7–5, 6–4
Runner-up	11.	18 November 2007	Shanghai, China	Hard (i)	Simon Aspelin	Mark Knowles Daniel Nestor	2–6, 3–6
Runner-up	12.	24 May 2008	Pörtschach, Austria	Clay	Jürgen Melzer	Marcelo Melo André Sá	7–5, 6–7(3–7), [11–13]
Runner-up	13.	22 February 2009	Marseille, France	Hard (i)	Andy Ram	Arnaud Clément Michaël Llodra	6–3, 3–6, [8–10]
Winner	12.	29 August 2009	New Haven, Unied States	Hard	Jürgen Melzer	Bruno Soares Kevin Ullyett	6–4, 7–6(7–3)
Winner	13.	11 October 2009	Tokyo, Japan	Hard	Jürgen Melzer	Ross Hutchins Jordan Kerr	6–2, 5–7, [10–8]
Runner-up	14.	1 November 2009	Vienna, Austria	Hard (i)	Jürgen Melzer	Oliver Marach Łukasz Kubot	6–2, 4–6, [9–11]
Runner-up	15.	21 February 2010	Marseille, France	Hard (i)	Robert Lindstedt	Julien Benneteau Michaël Llodra	4–6, 3–6
Runner-up	16.	24 September 2011	Bucarest, Romania	Clay	David Marrero	Daniele Bracciali Potito Starace	6–3, 4–6, [8–10]

Doubles performance timeline

Tournament	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011	2012	SR	W–L
Grand Slams
Australian Open	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	1R	2R	1R	3R	3R	1R	1R	1R	A	2R	0 / 10	6–10
French Open	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	3R	1R	2R	2R	QF	3R	3R	3R	2R	SF	A		0 / 10	17–9
Wimbledon	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	2R	1R	F	3R	A	1R	1R	1R	3R	3R		0 / 10	12–10
US Open	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	1R	2R	2R	2R	2R	W	2R	3R	1R	2R		1 / 11	13–10
Win–Loss	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	2–3	1–4	2–4	8–4	5–4	5–2	9–4	3–4	3–4	6–4	3–2	1–1	1 / 41	48–39
ATP Masters Series
Indian Wells	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	1R	QF	SF	1R	1R	1R	1R		0 / 8	5–8
Miami	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	3R	A	1R	1R	1R	2R	QF	SF	1R	1R		0 / 9	8–9
Monte Carlo	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	2R	SF	QF	QF	1R	A		0 / 6	4–6
Rome	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	2R	1R	2R	2R	1R	A		0 / 6	2–6
Madrid (Stuttgart)	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	A	A	QF	QF	1R	QF	A		0 / 5	4–5
Canada	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	2R	A	1R	2R	2R	A	2R	A		0 / 5	1–5
Cincinnati	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	A	1R	QF	A	A	QF	A		0 / 4	2–4
Shanghai	Not Held															SF	1R	A		0 / 2	3–2
Paris	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	1R	SF	QF	2R	A	A		0 / 4	3–4
Hamburg	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	A	2R	2R	2R	SF	QF	NM1				0 / 5	6–5
Win–Loss	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	0–0	2–1	0–0	2–6	1–5	4–8	12–9	6–8	8–7	3–8	0–2		0 / 54	38–54
Year End Ranking	463	488	–	384	365	184	162	84	58	38	28	32	23	7	24	21	32	81

External links

• Julian Knowle at the Association of Tennis Professionals
• Julian Knowle at the Davis Cup