Serena Williams Legacy: Everything You Need To Know

Retirement or not, Serena Williams is the GOAT (Greatest Of All Time) in tennis. She is an aggressive baseliner known for her powerful serves and forceful groundstrokes. Here is a brief on Serena Williams’s history in tennis and how she plans on moving forward. 

Serena Williams History and Family 

Serena is a Michigan-born 23-time Grand Slam singles winner. She is known to be only five when she started playing tennis. But she begs to differ. In a Vogue interview, Serena said, “My dad says I first picked up a racket when I was three, but I think it was even earlier. There’s a picture of Venus pushing me in a stroller on a tennis court, and I couldn’t have been more than 18 months.” 

Born the youngest in a large family of five sisters, Serena always had her elder sister Venus Williams to help and guide her tennis ambitions. Family always played an important role in motivating her, in fact, both Serena and Venus were coached by their father, Richard Williams. He began coaching them as kids until their 20s. Richard is known to be a strict coach and even moved the entire family to Florida so that the two sisters could attend a professional tennis academy. 

Serena Williams net worth is rumored to be at least $250 million. In 2017, she married Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and had a daughter named Alexis Olympia Ohanian Jr.

Serena Williams Awards in Tennis

Throughout her teenage career, Serena was overshadowed by her elder sister Venus Williams. Many predicted Venus would be the first to win a Grand Slam singles title. But Serena proved them wrong by winning her very first US Open in 1999. She also became the first among the sisters to win a career Grand Slam: US Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and Australian Open.

Over the years, Serena has won over 23 Grand Slam singles titles and the only person in the tennis “open era” history to do so. Serena and Venus Williams are the only players to win four gold medals in Olympics for tennis. 

Serena Williams Retirement 

Serena has openly stated her health took a turn after childbirth. She has undergone four surgeries within a span of seven days during her daughter Olympia’s birth. This was reflected in her tennis performance afterward. 

Although Serena was placed as a Top seed athlete, she never managed to win any Grand Slam titles after Olympia’s birth. Serena has never officially announced her retirement from tennis. However, in a 2022 Vogue article, Serena did mention that she would be ‘evolving’ to other endeavors. Nevertheless, Serena Williams’s history in tennis is world-renowned.