With over 100 years of history, the annals of tennis are packed with spectacular records that have excited and delighted audiences from around the world. Some are bizarre and others are spectacular beyond comprehension. We take a look at a few of the most incredible tennis records and the players behind them.
Longest tennis match
During the 2010 Wimbledon tournament, John Isner went up against Nicolas Mahut in an opening round match. Three days and over 11 hours on the court later, Isner finally defeated Mahut with staggering match figures of 6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7-3) and 70-78.
Most rackets smashed
Marat Safin is remembered as a great champion having won two Grand Slam titles. He is, however also considered as one of the game’s hottest heads. During the 1999 season, Safin managed to destroy no fewer than 48 rackets. The Russian has famously boasted that over his career, he broke 1,055 rackets.
Most aces in a season
In tennis, a strong serve can make all the difference. Although many just hope to have a good enough serve to build each point off, some players are able to use the serve as a weapon raking up hundreds of aces in a season. No player in history has done this better than Goran Ivanišević in 1996. During the season, the Croatian fired a total of 1,477 aces past his various opponents.
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Most singles titles
Over his career, Jimmy Connors managed to win a staggering 109 ATP singles titles. To put that into context, Roger Federer is the only active player even close to Connors and he has only won 86 titles. However, Connors single titles record is dwarfed by Martina Navratilova who won 167 WTA singles titles during her career. Current world No.1 Serena Williams, who is considered by many to be one of the greats of the game is a mind-blowing 99 titles short of Navratilova’s record.
Longest No. 1 streak
During his career, Rodger Federer has made a habit out of breaking records and going where few have gone before. His form was never more supreme than it was from 2 February, 2004 to 17 August, 2008. Over the 237 weeks, Federer smashed the record for most consecutive weeks as world number 1 blowing by the nearest competition and extending it far beyond the reach of anyone. When he finally slipped from the number 1 spot, he had more than doubled the previous record set by Pete Sampras.
Most weeks at No. 1
Although no player in the women’s or men’s game comes close to Federer’s streak of consecutive weeks at world number 1, when it comes to total weeks at number 1, there are three who surpass him and one that destroys the competition.
Steffi Graf won a total of 22 Grand Slams during her career including winning all four Grand Slam events in 1988, one of only six people to ever achieve the accolade in the singles game. During her illustrious career Graf would be at the pinnacle of the WTA rankings for a total of 377 weeks, over 40 more than the nearest competition in the women’s game and over 60 more than Federer.
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