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About Amélie Mauresmo
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You like women's tennis but don't know Amélie Mauresmo ?
Then it's about time !
With her relaxed manner and quick wit Amélie Mauresmo (FRA) is like a breath of fresh air when she struts into a room. While she possesses the confidence of her teenage counterparts on the professional tennis circuit, Mauresmo, 19-years old, is as quick to target herself as others with her sarcasm.
It is difficult to have a conversation with Amélie without being interrupted by the familiar jingle of her ever present mobile phone. If cell phones were not frowned upon in tennis stadiums worldwide many a match would be interrupted by Mauresmo dancing a little jig to the tune of her phone.

She is all action while at the same time self admittedly lazy. She detests the rigors of off-court training, much preferring the speed of downhill skiing, go-carts and horseback riding.

Nineteen year-old Amélie demonstrated some of her talent in May, 1998 when she came thru the qualifying event to reach the final of the German Open, a Tier I event in Berlin. Ranked No. 65 at the time, she ousted world No. 2 Lindsay Davenport, No. 3 Jana Novotna, and No. 14 Dominique Van Roost en route to her first ever singles final on the COREL WTA TOUR. She ended the year 1998 with a career high ranking of No. 29 in the world and was voted the second best Newcomer of the Year 1998 by the WTA.

Mauresmo is the first player on the women's tour since Martina Navratilova to talk publicly about being a lesbian.

With reaching the final in Berlin in May '98 she:

became the lowest ranked player ever to defeat two of the world's top three players in a tournament !

 became the first qualifier to reach a Tier-One event final !

With reaching the final at the Australian Open in January 1999 she:

became the first unseeded woman finalist at the Australian since Chris O'Neil in 1978 !

joined fellow countrywomen Mary Pierce and Nathalie Tauziat as the only French women to reach the finals of a Grand Slam in the Open era !


More about Amélie
Main
infos:
 Birthdate:  July 5, 1979
Birthplace: Saint Germain en Laye (~10 km west of Paris), France
Residence: Geneva, Switzerland
Height: 1.76 m
Weight:  64 kg (142 lbs.)
 
Family:
 Mother's name is Francoise
Father, Francis, is an engineer
Has an older brother, Fabien
 
Idols:
 Admires Yannick Noah - his great performance at the French Open 1983 was the main reason that inspired her to take up the game
Liked Stefan Edberg's serve-and-volley style
 

Hobbies

Horseback riding
Down-hill skiing (really fast!!)
Go-carting (she's really good at go-carting ! She won the players-race in Linz (Austria) '98)
Mixing dangerous drinks :-)
Likes driving fast
Likes reading Stefan Zweig's books
She loves hamburgers and pizzas
 

Love

That's a secret ?! ;)

 
Other
infos

She likes movies like "Seven"
Jon Bon Jovi is (was) one of her favourite singers
She hates journalists who try to "steal" her privacy.
After matches she used to sit somewehere beside the court and make some stretching. In the mean time she got too popular to do that beside the courts
Got a apple green Peugeot 106 kid
Got a cat called "Nelson"
Likes her confusion in her hotel-rooms :-)
Pronunciation of "Mauresmo": AHM-i-lee moh-RES-moh

Amélie's future plans after tennis

Mauresmo hopes to open a sports café in Paris after her tennis career has come to an end.
True to her nature, she does not wish to get involved with the daily tribulations of such an undertaking, preferring to work the crowd.
Hardly bashful, Amélie would love to try her hand at tending bar in her future café, ala Tom Cruise in the hit movie Cocktail.

"You know the way he tosses the bottles around and puts on a show when he mixes a drink, that's going to be me! The only problem is I'll probably lose a lot of money with all the alcohol that will end up on the floor."

Karine Quentric-Eagle, a former tennis professional who is Amélie's mentor on the Tour, jokes; "With Amélie behind the bar, after one cocktail, you're dead!"