The Grand Slam in tennis is the achievement of winning all four major championships in one discipline in the same calendar year, also referred to as the "Calendar-year Grand Slam" or "Calendar Slam". In doubles, a team may accomplish the Grand Slam playing together or a player may achieve it with different partners. Winning all four major championships consecutively but not within the same calendar year is referred to as a non-calendar-year Grand Slam, while winning the four majors at any point during the course of a career is known as a Career Grand Slam.
Rodney George Laver is an Australian former tennis player. Laver was the World No. 1 ranked professional in some sources in 1964, in all sources from 1965 to 1969 and in some sources in 1970, spanning four years before and three years after the start of the Open Era in 1968. He also was ranked the world No. 1 amateur in 1961 by Lance Tingay and 1962 by Tingay and Ned Potter.
John Donald Budge was an American tennis player. He is most famous as the first player — male or female, and still the only American male — to win the four tournaments that comprise the Grand Slam of tennis in a single year. Budge was the second man to win the Career Grand Slam after Fred Perry, and is still the youngest to achieve that feat. He won ten majors, of which six were Grand Slam events and four Pro Slams, the latter achieved on three different surfaces. Budge is considered to have the best backhand in the history of tennis, with most observers rating it better than that of later player Ken Rosewall. He is also the only man to have achieved the Triple Crown on three separate occasions, and the only man to have achieved it twice in one year. Budge was World number one amateur in 1937 and 1938 and World number one professional in 1939, 1940 and 1942.
Kenneth Robert Rosewall is an Australian former world top-ranking amateur and professional tennis player. He won a record 23 tennis Majors in singles, including 8 Grand Slam singles titles and, before the Open Era, a record 15 Pro Slam titles; overall, he reached a record 35 Major finals. He won the Pro Grand Slam in 1963. Rosewall won a record 24 major men's doubles titles. He won 9 grand slam titles in men's doubles with a career men's doubles grand slam and also won 15 Pro Slam men's doubles titles.
Carlos Moyá Llompart is a Spanish former world No. 1 tennis player. He was the French Open singles champion in 1998 and was the singles runner-up at the 1997 Australian Open. In 2004, he was part of his country's successful Davis Cup team. He has been Rafael Nadal's primary coach since 2016, and resides in Madrid, Spain.
Henry Ellsworth Vines Jr. was an American tennis champion of the 1930s, the World No. 1 player or the co-No. 1 in 1932, 1934, 1935, 1936 and 1937, able to win Pro Slam titles on three different surfaces. He later became a professional golfer, and won three titles on the PGA Tour.
Before the advent of the Open era of tennis competitions in April 1968, only amateurs were allowed to compete in established tournaments, including the four Majors. There was no prize money and players were compensated for travel expenses only. However many top tennis players turned professional to play legally for prize money in the years before the open era. They played in separate professional events, mostly on tours involving head-to-head competition, but also in professional tournaments as the biggest events on the pro tour. Professional tournaments, in particular the professional Majors, usually only had a men's draw.
Hans "Hanne" Nüsslein was a German tennis player and coach and former World professional number 1 tennis player who won four professional Majors singles titles during his career.
Marion Anthony Trabert was an American amateur world No. 1 tennis champion and long-time tennis author, TV commentator, instructor, and motivational speaker.
Karel Koželuh was a top Czech tennis, association football, and ice hockey player of the 1920s and 1930s. Koželuh never played in the major tournaments of amateur tennis but was an all-around athlete at the highest level.
Manuel Orantes Corral is a former tennis player from Spain who was active in the 1970s and 1980s. He won the US Open men's singles title in 1975, beating defending champion Jimmy Connors in the final. Orantes reached a career-high singles ranking of World No. 2.
Andrés Gimeno Tolaguera was a Spanish tennis player. His greatest achievement came in 1972, when he won the French Open and he remains the oldest first-time Grand Slam champion of the Open era at 34 years of age.
Philip Clive Dent is a former professional tennis player. Dent's high water mark as a pro singles player was reaching the Australian Open final in 1974, which he lost to Jimmy Connors in four sets. Dent was also the men's doubles champion at the Australian Open in 1975, and the mixed-doubles champion at the US Open in 1976.
Jadwiga ("Jed") Jędrzejowska was a Polish tennis player who had her main achievements during the second half of the 1930s. Because her name was difficult to pronounce for many people who did not speak Polish, she was often called by the nicknames "Jed" or "Ja-Ja".
Werner Schlager is a table tennis player and former world champion from Austria.
The racket sport traditionally named lawn tennis, invented in Croydon, now commonly known simply as tennis, is the direct descendant of what is now denoted real tennis or royal tennis, which continues to be played today as a separate sport with more complex rules. Most rules of (lawn) tennis derive from this precursor and it is reasonable to see both sports as variations of the same game. Most historians believe that tennis was originated in the monastic cloisters in northern France in the 12th century, but the ball was then struck with the palm of the hand; hence, the name jeu de paume. It was not until the 16th century that rackets came into use, and the game began to be called "tennis." It was popular in England and France, and Henry VIII of England was a big fan of the game, now referred to as real tennis.
Robert Larimore Riggs was an American tennis champion who was the World No. 1 amateur in 1939 and World No. 1 professional in 1946 and 1947. He played his first professional tennis match on December 26, 1941.
In 1930 the "Association Française des Professeurs de Tennis (AFPT)" held its first pro tournament, titled "Championnat International de France Professionnel" June 18–22, 1930, and is considered as a part of the professional grand slam from 1927 to 1967 till the advent of Open Era. The tournament only had a men's draw.
Kenny de Schepper is a French professional tennis player.
Jarmere Jenkins is a retired American professional tennis player who has become the hitting partner for Serena Williams. He was the 2013 Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) National Player of the Year and male ACC Athlete of the Year after earning the national championships in indoor singles, outdoor doubles and team competition while also finishing runner up in outdoor singles. He was the first Atlantic Coast Conference athlete to win ACC athlete of the year solely for tennis accomplishments. In his first full year as a pro, he cracked the top 200 in the 2014 year end rankings at 193, but the costs of travel became prohibitive for him and he retired in 2017.
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