Maria Sharapova

Maria Sharapova
Country (sports)	Russia
Residence	Bradenton, Florida, USA
Height	1.88 m (6' 2in)
Turned pro	2001
Retired	Active
Plays	Right-handed (two-handed backhand)
Prize money	$5,698,885
Singles
Career record	201-52
Career titles	11
Highest ranking	1 (22 August, 2005)
Grand Slam singles results
Australian Open	SF (2005, 2006)
French Open	QF (2004, 2005)
Wimbledon	W (2004)
US Open	SF (2005)
Doubles
Career record	27-6
Career titles	3
Highest ranking	No. 41 (14 June, 2004)
	Last updated on: 25 June, 2006.

Maria Yuryevna Sharapova (shah-RAH-puh-vuh; Russian: Мари́я Ю́рьевна Шара́пова; born April 19, 1987) is a former world number one Russian professional tennis player and part-time model. Her parents are originally from Gomel, Belarus, but moved to Russia in 1986, in the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. Sharapova was born in Nyagan, Russia, the following year. She now lives in the United States, but retains Russian citizenship.

Early life

At the age of three, Sharapova moved with her family to the Black Sea resort town of Sochi. She started playing tennis at the age of four, using a racquet given to her by the father of tennis star Yevgeny Kafelnikov, a native of Sochi. At the age of six, while in a tennis clinic in Moscow, Sharapova was spotted by Martina Navratilova, who urged her parents to get her serious coaching in the United States.

Barely able to make ends meet, Sharapova's parents took a risk. Sharapova and her father traveled to Florida to enroll at the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy. A visa problem meant a two-year separation between Sharapova and her father in America, and her mother in Russia.

To pay for her school fees, her father worked at several jobs at one time. A full scholarship granted by International Management Group made life more comfortable for the father and daughter.

Career

In 2004, after a spectacular run, which included three-set wins over Ai Sugiyama (5-7, 7-5, 6-2) and Lindsay Davenport (2-6, 7-6, 6-1), Sharapova became the third youngest Wimbledon women's champion (after Lottie Dod and Martina Hingis) and second youngest in the Open Era by defeating defending two-time champion Serena Williams in straight sets (6-1, 6-4). She also became the first Russian ever to win that tournament. Sharapova followed it up with a victory at the season-ending WTA Championships, knocking off Serena Williams yet again by a score of 4-6, 6-2, 6-4. In the final set, she came back from a defecit of 4-0, and still won.

Maria Sharapova currently uses the Prince o3 White Racket and consequently the popularity of the racket has gone through the roof.

At 6 ft 2 in., Sharapova is regarded by many as possessing a natural beauty and figure and has done some modeling in November 2003 with IMG Models. She enjoys fashion and is known to read celebrity magazines. However, she says she does not want to overdo these activities, preferring to focus on her tennis. She is often compared to Anna Kournikova, also a Russian, a Bollettieri student, and a model.

From June 2004 until her Wimbledon semi-final appearance in 2005, Sharapova had a 22-match winning streak on grass, including back-to-back Birmingham titles and the Wimbledon crown. Sharapova's huge success continued after winning Wimbledon, also. In November 2004, Sharapova signed a deal to represent Canon Inc. and promotes both their cameras and office products.

In April 2005, Sharapova was listed by People Magazine as among the 50 most beautiful celebrities in the world. In June 2005, Forbes magazine listed Sharapova as the highest-paid female athlete in the world, with annual earnings of $18 million. A significant portion of this amount came from endorsements.

Defending her Wimbledon title in 2005 proved to be a simple enough task at first, with Sharapova sailing through to the semi-finals with ease without losing a set. However, she dropped her first set of the tournament against a rejuvenated Venus Williams and lost the match 6-7 1-6 in one of the most thrilling and masterful displays of power and accuracy seen in the women's game. Sharapova's streak on grass was ended, as was her quest for the No. 1 ranking, with Lindsay Davenport, who lost a historic match to Venus Williams in the 2005 Wimbledon final, holding firm.

However, a back injury that Davenport sustained in the Wimbledon final meant that she could not defend her titles won during the US hard court season of 2004. Because of this, she lost valuable ranking points. Sharapova was also suffering from an injury and did not complete a tournament during the season, but she had fewer points to defend and therefore rose to the No. 1 ranking on August 22, 2005. Sharapova's reign was short-lived, lasting only a week after Davenport re-ascended after winning the New Haven title. Sharapova rose to the No. 1 ranking again on September 12, 2005 despite losing in the Semi-finals of the US Open.

Her loss in the semifinal of the 2005 US Open against Kim Clijsters marked the fourth time that season that she lost at a Grand Slam tournament against the eventual champion: Australian Open-SF-Serena Williams, French Open-QF-Justine Henin-Hardenne, Wimbledon-SF-Venus Williams, US Open-SF-Kim Clijsters. That streak was broken in January 2006, when Sharapova lost in the Australian Open semi-final to Justine Henin-Hardenne. Henin-Hardenne went on to lose in the final of the Australian Open to Amélie Mauresmo.

In February 2006, Sharapova featured in a six-page bikini photoshoot spread in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue annual magazine which debuted on Valentine's Day, along with 25 other scantily-clad supermodels. Sharapova joined the ranks of other athletes who have previously appeared in the publication. FHM Magazine ranked Sharapova eighth among the "100 Sexiest Women in the World" in its 2006 List, up from her 36th placement in the previous year's edition. [1]

On March 18, Sharapova, as No.3 seed, claimed her first title of the year at the Pacific Life Open at Indian Wells (a Tier 1 event), defeating No.4 seed Elena Dementieva in the final, 6-1 6-2. This is her first title in 2006 and the 11th in career. Sharapova is the first Russian to reach the final of the Pacific Life Open. As Dementieva reached the final later, surprisingly defeating Justine Henin-Hardenne, this was the first-ever all-Russian final at this Tier I tournament. Soon after, she had a run at the Nasdaq-100, which included a thrilling win over Tatiana Golovin, whom she beat 6-3, 6-7, 4-3 when Golovin retired with an ankle injury. She lost in the final, though, to a rededicated Svetlana Kuznetsova by a score of 4-6, 3-6. She then took 2 months off because of an ankle injury, which included pulling out of events in Rome and Istanbul, coming into the French Open with no clay-court warm up.

Through an ankle injury, Maria finally decided to participate at the 2006 French Open. After saving 3 match points in the 1st round against Mashona Washington, Sharapova was shockingly eliminated in the 4th round by Dinara Safina, the sister of Marat Safin. She blew a lead of 5-1 in the 3rd set, and lost 18 of the last 21 points to lose by a score of 5-7, 6-2, 5-7. She welcomed the onset of the grass season, but failed to add a third successive Birmingham title to her collection when she lost in the semi-finals to Jamea Jackson. She is currently ranked at No. 4 in the world, and is seeded at No. 4 for the upcoming 2006 Wimbledon.

Education

Sharapova studies via correspondence on the internet with the Keystone High School home schooling program and has a liking for sociology. As of 2004, she is in her second year of high school at 17 years of age. (TENNIS Magazine, September issue)

Awards

2003

WTA Newcomer of the Year

2004

WTA Player of the Year
WTA Most Improved Player of the Year
WTA Player Service

2005

ESPY Best Female Tennis Player
Named Russia's tennis federation as the country's best female player for the year
Awarded the honorary Master of Sports of Russia title

Trivia

Says what she enjoys most about being a professional tennis player is the travelling/getting to meet new people and see new cultures. [2]

Is good friends with fellow Russian tennis player Maria Kirilenko, despite not getting along with many of the other female Russian tennis players.^{[citation needed]}

Is affectionately called "Masha".^{[citation needed]}

Is currently single. (Stated by herself on Total Request Live)

Is ambidextrous, and was undecided about which hand to use dominantly up until her professional tennis career began. [3]

In June 2006, Maria appeared in a commercial for ESPN's This is SportsCenter campaign. In the commercial, she is walking past Stuart Scott's desk when he stops her. He offers her a can of tennis balls he received from a supplier. She says that the can is filled with papers "worms" and that she doesn't want it. Stuart acts offended, causing Maria to feel bad. She obliges to take the can, opens it, and paper worms fly into her face. She angrily walks away and throws the can back at Stuart after he asks for it back. This commercial is a sequel to a similar one feauturing Roger Federer.

Quotes

"Tennis gets me worked up. It's a drive! I forget about everything while playing and I don't care a damn about what is going on out of court".
"I’ve been playing against older and stronger competition my whole life. It has made me a better tennis player and able to play against this kind of level despite their strength and experience".
"I don’t follow other players or the tournaments they play. I have my own schedule and do my own thing".
"I'm not the next anyone, I'm the first Maria Sharapova."
"So this is just tennis. You wake up, you either step on your right foot or your left, and, you know, hopefully you step on your right."
"In a few years, hopefully, the stories won't be about my grunting or my looks, but about me being a great tennis player. With Monica Seles, everyone started talking about her being a big grunter, but who cares now that she grunts? When she walks on court, everyone thinks she's a champion."
"People always ask about young people like me being forced into things. I play tennis because I love it. I think Russians might be tougher than other people. When I arrived in America I was young, but I already knew what I wanted. I think that when you start from nothing, when you come from nothing, it makes you hungry. I am proud of where I came from and I know what I want. I want to win."
"Well, I mean, why would you want to be No. 20 and then when you get to No. 20 it's like you don't want to be No. 1, you know? It's like shoot for the moon. If you miss, you'll still be among the stars, so..."
"Well, you can't win every single day, that's just a fact. You know, it's impossible to win every single match, and it's one of those days where, you know, they lost. And, I mean, everyone's going to have a moment like that. There's only one winner in a tournament. So out of how many people in this draw, they're all going to be considered losers and only one's the winner. Unfortunately, that's just the sport we're in where, you know, you're either the winner, but the chance of that is slim, you know (laughing)."
"I definitely feel Russian inside, even when I'm in America I feel Russian,"
"It's good to finish the year with a win. But I didn't expect to win like that."
"When people start to focus on when I would win the second Grand-Slam champion, I feel indeed uneasy while playing at the court. But I know all I can believe at court is myself and my own racket."

Grand Slam singles finals

Wins (1)

Year	Championship	Opponent in Final	Score in Final
2004	Wimbledon	Serena Williams	6-1, 6-4

WTA Tour titles (14)

Singles (11)

Legend
Grand Slam (1)
WTA Championships (1)
Tier I Event (2)
WTA Tour (7)

Titles by Surface
Hard (7)
Clay (0)
Grass (3)
Carpet (1)

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent in the final	Score
1.	Sep 29, 2003	Tokyo, Japan	Hard	Aniko Kapros (Hungary)	2-6 6-2 7-6⁵
2.	Oct 27, 2003	Quebec City, Canada	Hard	Milagros Sequera (Venezuela)	6-2 retired
3.	Jun 7, 2004	Birmingham, Great Britain	Grass	Tatiana Golovin (France)	4-6 6-2 6-1
4.	Jun 21, 2004	Wimbledon, London, Great Britain	Grass	Serena Williams (USA)	6-1 6-4
5.	Sep 27, 2004	Seoul, South Korea	Hard	Marta Domachowska (Poland)	6-1 6-1
6.	Oct 4, 2004	Tokyo, Japan	Hard	Mashona Washington (USA)	6-0 6-1
7.	Nov 8, 2004	WTA Championships, Los Angeles, USA	Hard	Serena Williams (USA)	4-6, 6-2, 6-4
8.	Feb 6, 2005	Tokyo, Japan	Carpet	Lindsay Davenport (USA)	6-1 3-6 7-6⁵
9.	Feb 21, 2005	Doha, Qatar	Hard	Alicia Molik (Australia)	4-6 6-1 6-4
10.	Jun 6, 2005	Birmingham, Great Britain	Grass	Jelena Jankovic (Serbia & Montenegro)	6-2 4-6 6-1
11.	Mar 18, 2006	Indian Wells, USA	Hard	Elena Dementieva (Russia)	6-1 6-2

Singles finalist (4)

2004: Zurich (lost to Alicia Molik)
2005: Miami (lost to Kim Clijsters)
2006: Dubai (lost to Justine Henin-Hardenne)
2006: Miami (lost to Svetlana Kuznetsova)

Performance Timeline

Tournament	2006	2005	2004	2003	2002	Career
Australian Open	SF	SF	3r	1r	-	0
French Open	4r	QF	QF	1r	-	0
Wimbledon		SF	W	4r	-	1
U.S. Open		SF	3r	2r	-	0
Grand Slam Win-Loss	8-2	19-4	15-3	4-4	-	46-13
Tokyo	SF	W	2r	-	-	1
Indian Wells	W	SF	4r	1r	2r	1
Miami	F	F	4r	1r	-	0
Charleston	-	-	-	1r	-	0
Berlin	-	QF	3r	-	-	0
Rome	-	SF	3r	-	-	0
San Diego		-	QF	-	-	0
Montreal/Toronto		-	3r	1r	-	0
Moscow		QF	-	-	-	0
Zurich		-	F	-	-	0
WTA Tour Championships		SF	W	-	-	1
Tournaments played	7	15	20	14	2	58
Finals reached	3	4	6	2	0	15
Tournaments Won	1	3	5	2	0	11
Hardcourt Win-Loss	16-2	29-7	34-11	20-8	1-2	100-30
Clay Win-Loss	3-1	9-3	8-3	5-2	-	25-9
Grass Win-Loss	3-1	10-1	12-0	9-2	-	34-4
Carpet Win-Loss	5-2	5-1	1-1	-	-	11-4
Overall Win-Loss	27-6	53-12	55-15	34-12	1-2	170-47¹
Year End Ranking		4	4	32	186	N/A

Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-8 (quarter finals up to finalist).
¹ If ITF women's circuit (Hardcourt: 22-4; Clay: 9-1) participation is included, overall win-loss record stands at 201-52.

Famous matches

2003 Birmingham quarter-final: defeated Elena Dementieva, 2-6 7-6(4) 6-2. As a qualifier, Sharapova reached the tournament's semi-final, defeating top-seeded Dementieva along the way. Although she lost in the semis to Shinobu Asagoe, she has began to elicit the media attention, not just because of her model looks as compared to Anna Kournikova, but also because of her grunts. Fellow players and spectators had complained of her boisterous style. [5] Still, she followed this up with a fourth round showing at Wimbledon, equaling the best performance by a female wildcard in the tournament's history.
2004 Wimbledon semi-final: defeated Lindsay Davenport, 2-6 7-6(5) 6-1. The 13th seed Sharapova faced fifth seed Davenport in a match of youth versus experience. Sharapova was overwhelmed by the veteran in the first set, and was trailing 3-1 in the second set before she turned the match around, after a drizzle interrupted it. Although she was three points from defeat in the tiebreak, Sharapova fought back, consolidated her position to take the second set and cruise through the third. [6]
2004 Wimbledon final: defeated Serena Williams, 6-1 6-4. Sharapova faced the top seed in the final. She defeated the two-time defending champion in one of the most stunning upsets in Wimbledon history. In doing so, she became the second youngest women's Wimbledon champion in the Open Era, and the first non-American victor since Jana Novotna won in 1998.
2004 Tour Championships final: defeated Serena Williams, 4-6 6-2 6-4. Sharapova became the second player to win the Year-End Championships in her debut. Trailing 4-0 in the third set, Sharapova won the next six games after Williams began to struggle with an abdominal muscle strain. She finished the year ranked number four. Albeit her tournament run was characterized by controversy, marred by accusations of other Russian players that she had received coaching during matches, as well as some critics' reaction to her fist-pumping attitude in the final, as Williams suffered from her injury.
2005 Australian Open semi-final: lost to Serena Williams, 6-2 5-7 6-8. Continuing a seeming rivalry, Sharapova served for the match during the second and third set, even holding triple match point in the latter. However, Williams came back to take the match and win the tournament. [7]
2005 Indian Wells semi-final: lost to Lindsay Davenport, 0-6 0-6. Despite holding a 2-0 head-to-head record, Sharapova, then ranked number three in the world, was dealt her worst defeat as Davenport double bageled her. This marked the first time that a player in the top three was double bageled.
2005 Wimbledon semi-final: lost to Venus Williams, 6-7(2) 1-6. The match was billed as one of the best in years. The high quality match up featured long rallies, high-intensity groundstrokes just clipping the lines, and dramatic grunts. In the end, Williams beat the defending champion, ending Sharapova's 22-match grass court winning streak. [8] [9]

References

"Maria puts world domination on hold". (Nov. 11, 2005). New Straits Times, p. 42.

External links

Maria Sharapova Official Site
Maria Sharapova at the Women's Tennis Association
Maria Sharapova - Tennis Princess
Maria Sharapova at IMDb
Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue: Maria Sharapova

Preceded by Lindsay Davenport	World No. 1 August 22, 2005 - August 28, 2005 September 12, 2005 - October 23, 2005	Succeeded by Lindsay Davenport
Preceded by Nadia Petrova	WTA Most Improved Player 2004	Succeeded by Ana Ivanovic
Preceded by Justine Henin-Hardenne	WTA Player of the Year 2004	Succeeded by Kim Clijsters