At 35 Swiss Miss Hingis Is Still the Most Active Tennis Star with 20 Grand Slams in Her Kitty

On September 30, Martina Hingis celebrated her 35th birthday in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the hometown of China’s former world no.2 Li Na. Li is inarguably the most celebrated star in China’s tennis history and Hingis is in this city along with her women’s doubles partner India’s Sania Mirza to play the Dongfeng Motor Wuhan Open. The Indo-Swiss pair won their sixth WTA title together at Guangzhou, following their back-to-back Grand Slams crowns at Wimbledon and 2015 US Open. At Grand Slam level, Hingis is the winner of 5 singles, 11 women’s doubles and 4 mixed doubles titles and with 20 Majors, she is the third most active tennis player behind Serena Williams’ 36 and Venus Williams’s 22 Grand Slam victories. Other than playing tennis, Hingis found Li Na’s company at Wuhan and went around city landmarks on a guided tour. Li might have retired from tennis, but she is still able to make her presence felt from the sidelines. The Chinese and Swiss stars enjoyed each other’s company while in Wuhan. In the meanwhile, Hingis/Sania have already reached the round-of-four in 2015 Wuhan Open after defeating USA’s no.5 seeds Raquel Kops-Jones/Abigail Spears in the quarterfinal on Thursday. Another story doing the round at Wuhan was about Hingis and Sania having already scouted an official team-name with help from the twitterati.

The ever smiling Swiss Miss Martina Hingis reached 35 years of age on September 30, 2015. The big thing about Hingis is her ability to win tournaments at the level of the Grand Slams. She won two of her last majors at the 2015 US Open in mixed and women’s doubles only days ago. Hingis/Sania put an icing on the Grand Slam cake by winning the Guangzhou Open last week and yesterday they have reached the semifinal of the 2015 Wuhan Open as well. But Hingis is truly enjoying herself at a time, when tennis players hang their boots. In her prime nearly 20 years ago, she won her first Grand Slam tournament as a 15-year old child. No, it was not her first singles crown at the Australian Open in 1997. Six months earlier, Hingis had combined with Czech Republic’s Helena Sukova to win the 1996 Wimbledon doubles title. The teenager ruled women’s tennis for a number of years and after winning 5 singles and 9 doubles Grand Slams; retired at the age of 22!

But Hingis has since made a huge comeback. In 2015 alone, she has bagged 5 Grand Slam titles, 4 of which have come in the last three months. She has two Indians as her partners and all three of them are enjoying themselves as Grand Slam winners. With Leander Paes, Hingis won three mixed doubles crowns this year at Australian Open, Wimbledon and the US Open while another Indian Sania Mirza was Hingis’ women’s doubles partner as the duo won the Wimbledon and the US Open.

The amazing and nearly unachievable feat by Hingis is winning 5 Singles Grand Slams as a teenager after her first doubles Grand Slam in 1996. She won the Australian Open three times in 1997, 1998 and 1999; Wimbledon once in 1997 and in the same year Hingis also won the US Open. Hingis’ remaining 15 Grand Slam titles have come in women’s and mixed doubles.

Some days ago, women’s doubles top seeds decided to have a team-name for themselves on the lines of Brangelina, Kimye and Bennifer. They asked their twitter fans for suggestions and out of several choices offered by fans, they have already selected one. The tennis duo received names like Sanghis, Mirgis, HinZa, Marnia, Spicegirls, double aces, Indo-Swiss Express, awesome-twosome, MnM, Santina, Martinia and so on but they finally decided on Santina. During all this, Hingis/Sania kept playing their doubles matches at Wuhan and in the quarterfinals on Thursday, they defeated USA’s no.5 seeds Raquel Kops-Jones/Abigail Spears 6-2, 6-2. For a place in the final the Swiss-Indo pair will have to beat the Taiwanese combo of Hao-Ching Chan/Yung-Jan Chan. In the other quarterfinal, the Chan sisters beat Julia Goerges(Germany/Karolia Pliskova (Czech Republic) also by the margin of 6-2, 6-2 to earn the semifinal berth.