Former American tennis player Tony Trabert, winner of five Grand Slam tournaments in the 1950s, died on Wednesday at the age of 90, the sport’s Hall of Fame reported Thursday.
Trabert is remembered for starring in one of the best seasons in tennis history in 1955, when he won 18 tournaments, including three Grand Slams: Roland Garros, Wimbledon and the US Open.
Since then, the American is part of the select group of players who have won three Grand Slams in the same year, which also includes Don Budge (1938), Rod Laver (1962, 1969), Mats Wilander (1988), Roger Federer (2004). , 2006, 2007), Rafael Nadal (2010) and Novak Djokovic (2011, 2015).
At 25, Trabert finished 1955 with a record of 106 wins and seven losses, including a 38-game winning streak and 10 tournaments in a row. Only Ken Rosewall could defeat him that year in a Grand Slam game, in the semifinals of the Australian Open.
Before that extraordinary campaign, Trabert had already opened his Grand Slams account with the 1953 US Open and the 1954 Roland Garros.
After his retirement, the tennis player entered the Hall of Fame in 1970, a body of which he was president between 2001 and 2011. He also captained the American Davis Cup team between 1976 and 1980, achieving the titles of 1978 and 1979 with John McEnroe as a banner, and served for three decades as a television commentator.
Trabert “not only taught us all how to be a great champion,” his successor to the Hall of Fame presidency, Stan Smith, said Thursday. “He was also a role model as a wise coach and mentor, a fair and effective leader, and a fantastic ambassador for tennis in general.”
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