Gabriela Sabatini

Gabriela Sabatini
Country	Argentina
Residence	Buenos Aires and Boca Raton
Date of birth	May 16, 1970 (1970-05-16) (age 39)
Place of birth	Buenos Aires, Argentina
Height	1.75 m (5 ft 9 in)
Weight	59 kg (130 lb)
Turned pro	January 1985
Retired	1996
Plays	Right
Career prize money	$8,785,850
Singles
Career record:	632–189
Career titles:	27
Highest ranking:	No. 3 (February 27, 1989)
Grand Slam results
Australian Open	SF (1989, 1992, 1993, 1994)
French Open	SF (1985, 1987, 1988, 1991, 1992)
Wimbledon	F (1991)
US Open	W (1990)
Doubles
Career record:	252–96
Career titles:	14
Highest ranking:	No. 7 (November 6, 1988)
Grand Slam Doubles results
Australian Open	SF (1989)
French Open	F (1986, 1987, 1989)
Wimbledon	W (1988)
US Open	SF (1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1994)
Infobox last updated on: February 4, 2009.

Gabriela Beatriz Sabatini (b. May 16, 1970, in Buenos Aires, Argentina) is a former professional Argentine tennis player. She was one of the leading players on the women's circuit in the late-1980s and early-1990s. She won the women's singles title at the US Open in 1990, the women's doubles title at Wimbledon in 1988, and a silver medal at the 1988 Olympic Games.

 Career

Sabatini first came to the tennis world's attention as a junior. She started playing tennis at the age of 6, and won her first tournament at age 8. In 1983, age 13, she became the youngest player to win the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida. She won six major international junior titles, including the French Open girls' singles, and was ranked the World No. 1 junior player in 1984.

In 1985, aged 15 years and 3 weeks, Sabatini became the youngest-ever player to reach the semifinals at the French Open, where she lost to Chris Evert. She won her first top-level singles title later that year in Tokyo.

In 1988, Sabatini reached her first Grand Slam singles final at the US Open. She faced Germany's Steffi Graf, who had won the three previous Grand Slam singles events that year and was looking to win a fourth. Graf won the match 6–3, 3–6, 6–1. Sabatini was selected to represent Argentina in the 1988 Summer Olympics held in Seoul. (She also carried the country's flag in the opening ceremony.) She went on to win the silver medal in the women's singles competition. In the final, she again faced Graf, who was bidding to turn her Grand Slam into what the media had dubbed a "Golden Slam". Graf won 6–3, 6–3. Sabatini teamed-up with Graf to win the women's doubles title at Wimbledon that year. She also won 1988's year-end WTA Tour Championships.

Sabatini's next Grand Slam singles final came in 1990, where she again faced Graf in the final of the US Open. This time, Sabatini beat Graf 6–2, 7–6. She also beat Graf in a semifinal of the WTA Tour Championships but lost the final to Monica Seles in the event's first-ever five-set final 6–4, 5–7, 3–6, 6–4, 6–2.

Sabatini had a strong start to 1991, winning five tournaments in the first half of the year. She reached her third Grand Slam singles final at Wimbledon and yet again faced Graf. Graf prevailed 6–4, 3–6, 8–6, despite the fact that Sabatini served for the match on more than one occasion. Sabatini came close to attaining the World No. 1 ranking in 1992 but was narrowly denied by Graf and then by Seles. All three players' rankings were within a few points of each other for much of the year.

After winning five tournaments in 1992, Sabatini had a 29-month drought in which she failed to win a title. She brought this run to an end at the WTA Tour Championships in 1994 and then won her first tournament of 1995 at Sydney (defeating Lindsay Davenport in the final of both events). But that proved to be the last singles title of Sabatini's career.

In 1989, she launched her own perfume, simply named "Gabriela Sabatini". Since retiring from competitive tennis, she has launched several other perfume lines. In 1992, a red-orange fiery rose was named the "Gabriela Sabatini Rose" in her honor.

In 1994, the Great American Doll Company created a doll in Sabatini's likeness, dressed in tennis clothes. That same year, Sabatini published a motivational book entitled My Story (ISBN 1-886612-00-5), providing a look at her background and the inspirations that led her to become a tennis player.

Sabatini retired from the professional tour in 1996, having won 27 singles titles and 14 doubles titles. She reached her highest ranking of World No. 3 in 1989. Her last professional singles match was on October 14, 1996, when she lost to Jennifer Capriati 6-3, 6-4. (Capriati's first loss on the WTA tour was to Sabatini in 1990.) Sabatini played her last professional match on October 19, 1996, in the doubles semifinals in Zurich with Lori McNeil. Sabatini was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame on July 15, 2006.