Steffi Graf fortune

Short introduction

Steffi Graf, actually Stefanie Maria Graf, was a German tennis player who won 22 Grand Slam tournaments and, in 1988, gold at the Olympics, the “Golden Slam”. It holds the world record for weeks of leadership in the world rankings with 377 weeks in total. After her career, she married ex-tennis professional Andre Agassi and lives with him and her two children in the USA, but is still one of the most successful tennis players of all time.

Early life

From her very early childhood, her father introduced her to playing tennis. At the age of three, she started to hit her. Her father Peter Graf was a qualified tennis instructor. He discovered a high level of motor skills in his daughter and began to increase the difficulty of the tasks for the very young Steffi Graf. In 1977 Steffi Graf won her first tennis tournament at the age of seven (!) Years. So her father gave up his remaining jobs and devoted himself entirely to promoting her career. And this should take an incredible run in 1981 with the first participation of Steffi Graf. As an eleven-year-old player, she challenged some adults so much that they needed several sets to beat Steffi Graf.

In 1982, Steffi Graf consequently won the German championship for eighteen-year-olds – when she was thirteen years old. The press already spoke of a “child prodigy” and that’s how it should be. In October 1982 she was finally registered as a professional player with the WTA. The father countered any criticism of the early date with the fact that there was no way around it.

Career

However, Steffi Graf lost her first game as a professional quite clearly. Still, their ascent was unstoppable. Already in 1983 she played at the French Open, where she already reached the second round. The experts were particularly impressed by their hard forehand. At the end of that year she already ranked 98th in the world rankings.

The following year she was among the last 32 players at the Australian Open and Wimbledon. At the Olympics in Los Angeles in the same year, but at that time only held as a screening competition, she won as the youngest player in the entire field. In the meantime, she had moved up to 22nd place in the world rankings.

In 1985 she reached the round of 16 in Paris and Wimbledon. As a now ranked 6th player in the world rankings, she was one of the top stars on the scene and had already earned half a million DM in prize money.

In the months that followed, she was only slightly defeated by the dominating giants in the industry before she finally made her breakthrough in 1987. This year, she won a total of eleven tournaments and won her first Grand Slam tournament. In addition, she took over the leadership of the world rankings.

The next year should be even more successful for Steffi Graf. In 1988 she won all four Grand Slam tournaments and the Olympic tennis tournament, which was then celebrated in her honor as the “Golden Slam”. Something that nobody ever achieved before and after.

Her absolute dominance in world tennis then continued for another four years before she became a serious competitor in Monica Seles. At times she had to give up her leadership in the world rankings. From 1993 to 1996 she regained her former dominance. Between 1993 and 1994 she won four consecutive Grand Slam tournaments, then more. For the first time, however, there were certain signs of wear due to longer breaks in injury.

Added to this was her father’s tax scandal, which took her mentally seriously. After a final rally entitled 1999 at the French Open, she ended her career as an active tennis player at the age of 30. During this time she had won 7x Wimbledon, 5x the French Open, 5x the US Open and 4x the Australian Open. In total, she won 107 tournaments.

Career highlights

The sporting highlight was the exceptional year in 1988, in which Steffi Graf won all four Grand Slam tournaments and the Olympics in Seoul. So she is the only winner of the “Golden Slam”.

But her long time at the top of the world rankings also represents a highlight in Steffi Graf’s career, which is full of success.

Famous quotes

“There is nothing that surpasses the moment of the transformed match ball, the awareness of having prevailed.”

“The more you think in the match, the slower the movements become. It usually costs victory. ”

Amazing facts

In 1997, her father was sentenced to nearly four years in prison for tax evasion in relation to the prize money he administered.

Her brother Michael Graf was a successful motorsport driver in Formula 3.

Her son was born in 2001, her daughter in 2003.

She holds the record for the shortest grand slam final ever when she won 6-0 and 6-0 at the 1988 French Open in just 32 minutes.

With its estimated 150 million euros in assets, it is still one of the 1,000 richest Germans (as of 2019).