A Decade of Grand Slams: Part Four
In the last of this series, we take a look at the last Grand Slam event of a season.
4. U.S. Open
The fourth and final Grand Slam event of the tennis calendar is the United States Open (U.S. Open), which is played in late August and early September. It is played on acrylic hard courts at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis
Centre at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park in Queens, New York City.
Aussie Lleyton Hewitt won his first ever Grand Slam title after winning the U.S. Open in 2001. Joining him that year as the women’s singles titlist was American Venus Williams. It was her second and last U.S. Open title. The men’s
doubles titlist that year was the team of Wayne Black and Kevin Ullyett from Zimbabwe. Aussie Rennae Stubbs and American Lisa Raymond won the women’s doubles title that year.
In 2002, the women’s double title at the U.S. Open went to the duo of Spanish Virginia Pascual and Argentinean Paolo Suarez. They retained the title till 2004. In 2005, Lisa again won the title though this time she was paired with
Aussie Samantha Stosur. In years to follow, French Nathalie Dechy bagged the title. In 2006, she won with Russian Vera Zvonareva and in 2007 with Dinara Safina. The Williams’ sisters won their second doubles title at U.S. Open in 2009. 2010 saw the crowning
of American Vania King and Kazakh Yaroslava Shvedova.
Like other Grand Slams, the men’s singles title also saw one player dominating the list. Pete Sampras won his last Grand Slam title in 2002 after he bagged the singles title at U.S. Open. He retired from professional tennis the
same year. His compatriot, Andy Roddick bagged the title in 2003. 2004 saw the rise of Swiss Roger Federer, who then retained the title for the next five years till 2008. In 2009 he lost the title to Argentinean Juan Martin del Potro. It was Potro’s first
ever Grand Slam win. In 2010, Spanish Rafael Nadal won his first ever U.S. Open title completing his set of all four Grand Slam wins and an Olympic medal. He became the third professional since Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi to win a career Golden Slam.
The women’s singles also saw a pattern throughout the decade. In 2002, American Serena Williams won her second U.S. Open title. The following year she lost her title to Belgian Justine Henin. The Belgians then alternated a title
win in coming years. Compatriot Kim Clijsters won the title in 2005, 2009 and 2010, while Henin returned for a title win in 2007. Serena returned for her third U.S. Open title win in 2008. The 2004 and 2006 wins went to Russians, Svetlana Kuznetsova and Maria
Sharapova respectively.
The 2000 men’s doubles title winner, Max Mirnyi won the title again in 2002 partnering Indian Mahesh Bhupathi. In 2004, Canadian Daniel Nestor and Bahamian Mark Knowles won the doubles title. After this win, Nestor became the second
individual doubles player to win a career Golden Slam. The Bryan twins, Mike and Bob won their first doubles U.S. Open title in 2005. They returned for a title win in 2008 and then in 2010. Leander Paes won the title in 2006 partnering Martin Damm and then
in 2009, partnering Lukas Dlouhy.
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