Martina Navratilova used to be the top female tennis player on Earth. Although she became a United States citizen in 1981, she was originally from Czechoslovakia where she was born in 1956 on October 18th. She was first introduced to tennis by her stepfather and coach, Miroslav Navratil. When she was only 15 years old, Martina became the national tennis champion of the Czech Republic. After competing in Orlando, Florida, she won her first title for the singles division when she was just seventeen. In 1975, she moved beyond being an amateur tennis player.

In 1975’s Grand Slam singles tournaments, she was one of the finalist in both the Australian Open and French Open, but she lost in both the finals to Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Chris Evert, respectively. The same year, she even lost in the semi finals of the US Open the same year after which she made her mind to get the green card of United States. In 1978, Navratilova got her first victory in the Grand Slam singles at Wimbledon and at the same she acquired the world number 1 rank after defeating Chris Evert.

It was due to Martina’s aggression and supremacy on the Court that the standard for tennis competition grew by leaps and bounds. Because she was slightly overweight early in her career, one of her initial obstacles was getting fit to play the game. Fortunately, a basketball player by the name of Nancy Lieberman encouraged her to attain this goal. She created an intense exercise regime in order to increase her personal fitness. The fact that she began using graphite racquets was probably paramount in her ability to reign supreme as a tennis player.

She again beat Evert in the 1981 Grand Slam singles, in Australia Open. The next year she won the French and Wimbledon Open. In 1983, she won in three out of four Grand Slam events.

She had scored the best ever-professional winning percentage as a tennis player. She retaliated back by winning the French Open Grand Slam of the year 1984, which she had lost in 1983. This superb victory was called the Grand Slam by the president of the International Tennis Federation, Philippe Chatrier. From 1982-1984, she lost only six of the singles matches.

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