| Nathalie Tauziat |
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Tauziat played right-handed, had a height of 1.65m and weighed 54.5 kg in 1996. She mostly practiced the serve and volley game during her career. She lived in Saint-Tropez in the French Riviera during the early stages of her career and later moved to Bayonne in the southwest of France . She turned professional in 1985. She retired from the WTA Tour tennis circuit after the French Open in 2003, after having only played doubles in 2002 and 2003. Her highest WTA Tour singles and doubles rankings were both number three. She had career official prize money earnings of US$6,649,907. Her final career singles win-loss record was @606-365 and final career doubles win-loss record was - @525-325 (@includes main draw and qualifying matches in all WTA Tour /ITF Tour tournaments, Federation/ Fed Cup and Olympic Games ). She was coached by Régis De Camaret throughout her professional career. Tauziat won her first WTA Tour singles title in her home country in Bayonne in 1990. This was followed by tournament victories in Quebec City in 1993, Eastbourne in 1995 and Birmingham in 1997. In 1991, she reached the French Open singles quarter-final for the first and only time, becoming the first Frenchwoman to do so since 1978 when Brigitte Simon reached the semi-final in that year. She was one of the true late bloomers in women's tennis; she moved into the world's tennis elite when she was about thirty in 1997. She reached a Grand Slam singles final only once in her career and she did it after 43 appearances in a Grand Slam tournament; she was the runner-up in the Women's Singles Wimbledon Championship in 1998 when she was defeated by Jana Novotná by 4-6, 6-7. Her appearance in the 1998 Wimbledon singles final was the first by a Frenchwoman since the 1920s when the legendary Suzanne Lenglen dominated it. She finished the year by becoming the first Frenchwoman in history to make more than a million dollars in official prize money earnings - US$1,038,310. She broke into the top 10 singles rankings in 1998, becoming only the third Frenchwoman after Françoise Durr and Mary Pierce to do so. On Feb 7, 1999, she became one of three Frenchwomen to be ranked in the singles Top 10, the first time France had three women ranked in the Top 10 simultaneously ( Mary Pierce at No. 5, Tauziat at No. 6, Sandrine Testud at No. 9). France was third nation after the USA and Australia to have more than two representatives in the singles Top 10 at any one time. This occurred again between November 15, 1999 and January 9, 2000 when Tauziat, Julie Halard-Decugis , Amélie Mauresmo and Mary Pierce were all ranked among the singles Top 10 simultaneously, the first time France had four women ranked in the Top 10. She became the third-oldest player to win a Tier 1 WTA Tour event since 1981 when she won the tournament in Moscow in 1999. This was followed by the singles title in the Tier II tournament in Leipzig ; it marked the first and only time she had won more than one WTA Tour singles title in the same year. She reached the season-ending Tour Championships semi-final for the second time in 1999 (the first was in 1997). She attained a career-high WTA Tour single ranking of number three at age 32 years and 6 months in the spring of 2000, making her the oldest woman to debut in the Top 3 and the fourth-oldest to be ranked in the Top 4. In the same year, she reached her first and only US Open singles quarter-final. In 2001, she competed in her 18th French Open , an all-time record at the tournament that was matched in 2005 by Conchita Martínez of Spain . In the same year, she picked up the eighth and final singles title of her career, and third on grass, at Birmingham to re-enter the Top 10 and become the oldest winner of a singles title since 1994 at 33 years, 8 months. About two weeks later, she reached the Wimbledon singles quarter-final for the fifth time, becoming the oldest female Grand Slam tournament quarterfinalist at 33 years, 8 months since Martina Navratilova in 1994. She finished 2001 with 112 career grass-court match wins, fifth on the Open Era list ( Martina Navratilova -309, Chris Evert -207, Pam Shriver -188 and Helena Suková -125). In the summer of 2001, she won her 600th career singles match en route to a fourth round finish at the US Open , only the 11th player to reach that milestone in the Open Era . In October 2001, she became at 34 years, 12 days the fourth-oldest player to qualify in singles for the season-ending Tour Championships (the nineth time she had done so) and also qualified in doubles for the seventh time. She attained a career-high number 3 doubles ranking on Oct 8, 2001. Remarkably, she was seeded in singles at every tour event she played in the last four years of her career. Tauziat has won a total of 8 WTA Tour singles and 25 WTA Tour doubles titles, 8 of them with fellow Frenchwoman Alexandra Fusai . She has secured WTA Tour doubles tournament victories at least once on four different surfaces - clay, grass, hardcourt and indoor. She was the runner-up in WTA Tour singles and doubles tournaments on 14 and 32 occasions (11 of them with Fusai) respectively. Tauziat represented her country in the -winning team in 1997, in which she won both of her singles matches in the opening round against Japan , the doubles matches against Belgium in the next round and against the Netherlands in the final with Alexandra Fusai . She made Fed Cup history in her 1997 singles win over Japan when she defeated Naoko Sawamatsu 75 46 17-15; the final set was the longest set ever in Fed Cup singles and the 54 games in the match tied the record for the most games in a rubber. Tauziat was also an excellent doubles player. In addition to her 57 career of France in the 1980s and the early 1990s, followed by Judith Wiesner of Austria , Julie Halard-Decugis of France , Alexandra Fusai of France and Kimberley Po-Messerli of the USA. She also played in the season-ending Tour Championships on seven occasions between 1988 and 2001; she was the runner-up with Alexandra Fusai in 1997 and 1998. She was a WTA Tour doubles semi-finalist on 42 occasions, excluding Grand Slams: 1985(3), 1986(1), 1987(2), 1988(3), 1989(5), 1990(1), 1991(1), 1993(2), 1994(2), 1995(3), 1996(1), 1997(2), 1998(4), 1999(4), 2000(3), 2001(5) Tauziat has written a book with the title "Les Dessous du tennis féminin" (published in 2001 in French) in which she gave her insights into life in the women's professional tennis circuit. In 2004, Tauziat received a state honour - le chevalier de la Légion D'honneur - from French President Jacques Chirac for her contributions to international tennis. Tauziat has been an official WTA Tour mentor to a rising star of French tennis, Marion Bartoli , since 2003. Tauziat is a first cousin of Didier Deschamps , a former, world-class professional Soccer player from France . She married Ramuncho Palaurena on July 16, 2005. The couple have a daughter, born in 2005 before their marriage. WTA TOUR SINGLES FINALS (8-14 RECORD) 1988: RU - Nice(France), Mahwah(New Jersey); 1990: W - Bayonne(France); RU - Wichita(Kansas); 1991: RU - Zürich(Switzerland); 1992: RU - San Antonio(Texas), Bayonne(France); 1993 W - Quebec City(Canada); 1995 W - Eastbourne(England); 1996: RU - Birmingham(England); 1997: W - Birmingham(England); RU - Zürich(Switzerland), Chicago(Illinois); 1998: RU - Wimbledon to Jana Novotná(Cze) 4-6,6-7(2-7) , Leipzig(Germany); 1999: W – Moscow(Russia), Leipzig(Germany); RU – Birmingham(England), Eastbourne(England); 2000: W – Paris Indoor Open(France); 2001: W – Birmingham(England); RU – Dubai(United Arab Emirates) WTA TOUR DOUBLES FINALS (25-32 RECORD) AND GRAND SLAM QUARTER FINALS AND BEYOND 1987: W - Paris Open(France), Zürich(Switzerland) with Isabelle Demongeot(Fra); Fr Open QF with Demongeot; 1988: W - West Berlin(West Germany), Zürich(Switzerland) with Demongeot; RU - Nice(France), Brighton(England) with Demongeot; 1989: W - Hamburg(West Germany) with Demongeot; RU -Zürich(Switzerland) with Judith Wiesner(Aut); 1990: W - Brighton(England) with Helena Suková(Cze); RU - Chicago(Illinois) with Arantxa Sánchez Vicario(Spn); Fr Open SF with Wiesner; 1991: W - Bayonne(France) with Patricia Tarabini(Arg); RU - Barcelona(Spain) with Wiesner, Carlsbad(California) with Gigi Fernandez(US); 1992: RU - Barcelona(Spain) with Wiesner; Fr Open QF with Demongeot; 1993: W – Melbourne(Australia) with Nicole Provis(Aus); RU - Quebec City(Canada) with Katerina Maleeva(Bul); Fr Open QF with Maleeva; 1994: W - Los Angeles(California) with Julie Halard(Fra), Quebec City(Canada) with Elna Reinach(SA); RU - Barcelona(Spain) with Halard; Fr Open SF with Halard; 1995: W - Linz(Austria) with Meredith McGrath(US); Fr Open QF & US Open QF with Halard; 1996: W - Leipzig(Germany), Luxembourg(Luxembourg) with Kristie Boogert(Hol); RU - Paris Indoors(France), Indian Wells(California) with Halard-Decugis, Birmingham(England) with Lori McNeil(US), Oakland(California) with Irina Spirlea(Rom); 1997: W - Linz(Austria), Chicago(Illinois) with Alexandra Fusai(Fra); RU - Indian Wells(California) with Lisa Raymond(US), Birmingham(England) with Linda Wild(US), Tour Championships, Atlanta(Georgia), Quebec City(Canada) with Fusai; Fr Open SF, US Open QF with Fusai; US Open mixed doubles QF with Daniel Nestor(Can); 1998: W - Linz(Austria), Strasbourg(Fra), New Haven(Connecticut) with Fusai; RU - Tour Championships, Indian Wells(California), Berlin(Germany), Carlsbad(California) with Fusai; Fr Open QF with Fusai; 1999: W – Prostějov(Czech Republic), Berlin(Germany) with Fusai; RU – Hanover(Germany), Rome(Italy), Strasbourg(France) with Fusai, Zürich with Natasha Zvereva(Blr); Fr Open SF with Fusai; 2000: W – Eastbourne(England) with Ai Sugiyama(Jpn), Montreal(Canada) with Martina Hingis(Swi), Luxembourg(Luxembourg) with Fusai; RU – Pan-Pacific Open(Tokyo, Japan) with Fusai, Linz(Austria) with Sugiyama; Fr Open SF with Fusai; 2001: W – Miami(Florida) with Arantxa Sánchez Vicario(Spn), Los Angeles(California) with Kimberly Po-Messerli(US), Leipzig(Germany) with Elena Likhovtseva(Rus); RU – Paris Indoor Open(France), Nice(France), Birmingham(England) with Po-Messerli(US); Fr Open QF, Wimbledon SF, US Open RU with Po-Messerli; 2002: RU – Birmingham (England) with Po-Messerli; Wimbledon QF with Po-Messerli WTA TOUR CHAMPIONSHIPS (SINGLES RECORD: 6-9; DOUBLES RECORD: 5-7) 1988: Doubles – 1st rd with Isabelle Demongeot(Fra); 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1993: Singles - 1st rd; 1994: Doubles – 1st rd with Julie Halard(Fra); 1995: Doubles - lost playoff match with Julie Halard-Decugis(Fra) for the final (8th) berth; 1997: Singles - SF, Doubles - RU with Alexandra Fusai(Fra); 1998: Singles - QF, Doubles - RU with Fusai; 1999: Singles – SF, Doubles –QF with Fusai; 2000: Singles – QF, Doubles – QF with Fusai; 2001 – Singles – 1st rd, Doubles – SF with Kimberly Po-Messerli(US) GRAND SLAM RECORDS Grand Slam singles record (excluding qualifying matches) : A - 4-3; F - 30-18; W - 40-16; US - 27-16; overall - 101-53 Grand Slam women's doubles record(QF or better): French Open - SF('90,'94,'97, ’99, ‘00), QF('87,'92,'93,'95,'98,‘01); Wimbledon – SF(’01), QF(’02); US Open – RU(’01), QF('95, '97) Grand Slam mixed doubles record (QF or better): U.S. Open - QF(’97) FEDERATION/FED CUP AND OLYMPIC GAMES Fed Cup (formerly Federation Cup) record {Link without Title} : 1985 – 2-0(1-2); 1986 - 0-1(1-0); 1987 - 1-1; 1989 - 0-1; 1990 - 2-1; 1991 - 1-1(0-1); 1992 - 2-1(2-1); 1993 - 3-1(2-0); 1994 - (3-1); 1995 - (1-1); 1996 - 0-2(1-1); 1997 - 2-0(2-0); 1998 - (1-1); 1999 – 0-2(0-1); 2000 – 0-1(3-0); 2001 – (3-0); overall singles and doubles record: 33-21; overall singles record: 13-12; overall doubles record: 20-9 Olympic Games: Seoul 1988 (singles 2nd rd; doubles QF with Isabelle Demongeot); Barcelona 1992 (singles 2nd rd; doubles QF with Isabelle Demongeot); Atlanta 1996 (singles 1st rd; doubles 2nd rd with Mary Pierce); overall singles record: 2-3; overall doubles record: 4-3 CAREER SUMMARY
Notes: WTA singles ranking was as of end of the WTA Tour season
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