By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_Now | Tuesday, October 1, 2024
Photo: Clive Brunskill/Getty
Serena Williams I know what it’s like to share court with family.
23-time Grand Slam champion Serena was pregnant when she beat her older sister Venus Williams to win the 2017 Australian Open Championship.
Together, the Williams sisters won 14 major doubles titles and three Olympic gold medals in doubles.
However, Serena says her main memory of dynamic doubles with Venus is not a win, but a loss. And not just any loss.
In a new interview with Glamor Serena Williams debunks every tennis mythSerena shares her best doubles memory: The day Venus lost it on the court sending Serena into uncontrollable laughter.
“Obviously, winning Olympic gold (in doubles) three times was really cool,” Serena told Glamour. “One of my best memories in doubles is actually our loss and Venus just passed out on the court because it’s so quiet.
“And I was laughing the whole time. And we lost four points because I couldn’t stop laughing.”
Playing next to her older sister was both a blessing and a burden, Serena says.
“Honestly, I think for me doubles might have been a little bit harder (than singles) because I never wanted to let my partner down, which was Venus,” said Serena, who also partnered James Blake to lead the team. of the USA in the Hopman Cup. and was a strong Fed Cup (now Billie Jean King Cup) competitor. “Like in singles, if you make a mistake, that’s one thing, it’s up to you. But if you make a mistake in doubles, it’s like: Oh, I’m dropping my partner.
“That was a lot of pressure for me because I never wanted to let him down.”
The Williams sisters famously left Summer Slamincluding four consecutive Grand Slam doubles championships – 2009 Wimbledon, 2009 US Open, 2010 Australian Open and 2010 Roland Garros – to hold all four major doubles crowns simultaneously.
Venus and Serena captured 14 major doubles championships together, including six Wimbledon doubles titles.
One reason they won Wimbledon four more times than their home Slam, where the sisters won two US Open doubles titles, is simple, Venus says. US Open organizers often schedule the Williams sisters’ doubles matches at night, which Venus said reduced their rest and recovery time for singles.
Consequently, the Williams sisters ended up pulling the plug on the US Open doubles.
“We’ve never played this much at the US Open,” Venus Williams said on her YouTube channel. “One of the reasons was because they would give us really tough schedules.
“So they would set us up to play a doubles night match. And then we’ll have to go back – you’ll go all the way to Queens – and come back to the city. It doesn’t end until midnight. Come back the next day and you have to play a singles match and a doubles match.
“(The US Open) never gave us a favorable doubles schedule. So we never played (at the US Open) very often because you physically can’t do that.
“Honestly, the schedule cost us at times in singles and doubles because of the way they scheduled us. So we just had to stop playing (US Open doubles) so much.”
Answering it Fascinating viewer questions, Serena offers her views on:
*Funts vs shorts
*Why Grunting works
*Places off the court where you’ll see him wearing tennis gear
* Playing Wii Tennis
Serena Williams, who received a standing ovation from fans at Arthur Ashe Stadium on her return to the US Open earlier this month, also shares her views on tennis versus pickleball. Serena says that most good tennis players can become good pickleball players, but she questions whether the opposite is true.
“I don’t play pickles. But I think if you play good tennis, you can probably play the ball very well,” says Serena. “If you play pickleball, you’re probably not going to be that good at tennis. Because tennis is a different sport.
“Like you can go from tennis to ball. I don’t think you can necessarily go from ball to tennis. So definitely a myth there.”
