Ernests Gulbis (born August 30, 1988) is a Latvian professional tennis player. He is currently ranked 48th in the world for singles. In 2008, Gulbis won his first ATP Tour doubles title in Houston. His career high also include quarterfinals on French Open, where he lost to Novak Djokovic. Gulbis is coached by Karl Heinz Wetter. He used to be coached by Nikola Pilic, the former Yugoslavian tennis player and Croatian and German Davis Cup captain, and trained at the Niki Pilic Tennis Academy in Germany since he was 12. Personal life Gulbis first started playing tennis with his grandmother and considers basketball, football and hockey as his favourite sports. His father, Ainars, is an investment businessman and his mother, Milena, is a theatre actress. The second of five children, Ernests Gulbis has three sisters (Elina, Laura and Monika) and one younger brother named Kristaps. Gulbis comes from a sporting family and his grandfather, Alvils, was one of the starting five players on ASK Riga, the Soviet Union basketball team that won the European Championships. His other grandfather, Uldis Pucitis, was a popular actor and film director. He comes from a very wealthy family and has been known to travel to matches in a private jet. Gulbis speaks three languages: Latvian, Russian, English and a little German. Tennis career The highlights of his career up to 2006 are: reaching the final of the Oberstaufen Challenger in July 2006, where Ernests Gulbis lost to Michal Tabara; reaching the final of the Tampere Challenger, also in July 2006, where he lost to Florian Mayer; reaching the semi-finals of ATP St. Petersburg Open as a wildcard in October, where he lost to Mario Ancic; and winning the Eckental Challenger in November, where he defeated Philipp Petzschner.
Gulbis started his season as a qualifier in the Sydney Medibank International, losing in the first round to Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus. He was subsequently defeated in the first qualifying round of the Australian Open. Ernests Gulbishas been relatively successful on the Challenger circuit in 2007. He reached the quarterfinals in Bergamo (l. to Fabrice Santoro) and the semifinals in Heilbronn (l. to Michael Llodra). Gulbis won his second Challenger title by triumphing over the local favourite, Edouard Roger-Vasselin, at the Besançon Challenger in France, enabling him to break into the ATP Top 100 for the first time in his career. In his next tournament, the Sarajevo Challenger, Gulbis emerged victorious in both the singles and doubles events. In the first week of October, he won the Mons Challenger in Belgium (d. Kristof Vliegen) as the top seed, breaking into the AP Top 50 for the first time in his career and surpassing Juan Martin Del Potro as the highest-ranked player born in 1988. Grand Slam debut Ernests Gulbis announced his arrival on the Grand Slam stage in the 2007 French Open by defeating the British veteran, Tim Henman in straight sets to advance to the second round. It was heralded by the British Davis Cup captain, John Lloyd, as "... a brilliant performance from Gulbis, that is just pure and utter talent." Gulbis' run was halted in the second round by Spaniard Álbert Montañés with a 1–6 2–6 6–1 6–7(3) defeat in a rain-interrupted match. At Wimbledon, his second Grand Slam participation, Gulbis again was drawn to face Marcos Baghdatis in the first round. He succeeded in winning the first set off the tenth-seeded Cypriot before succumbing in four sets. Gulbis debuted in Grand Slam doubles by teaming up with Ivan Ljubicic, with whom he had reached the semi-finals of the 2007 Ordina Open. At the 2007 U.S. Open, Ernests Gulbis upset the No. 30 seed, Potito Starace, in the first round and the No. 8 seed, Tommy Robredo, in the third round, winning by a convincing score of 6–1, 6–3, 6–2. In that match, Gulbis broke Robredo six times and had 39 winners to Robredo's seven. Gulbis' fine run was finally halted by former world Number 1, Carlos Moya, to whom he lost in four sets.
2008 At the first round of 2008 Australian Open, Gulbis lost to Marat Safin 0–6, 4–6, 6–7. He got to the second round of the 2008 Pacific Life Open, where he lost a tight match David Nalbandian 6–4 4–6 7–64. At one point, he was up a break in the third set, having served out the previous game with 4 aces. Unfortunately, he eventually gave the match away in the tiebreak. In first round of 2008 Miami Masters he won against Dominik Hrbatý, but in second round met Nikolay Davydenko. After winning first set with 6-3, he lost following two sets in tiebreaks. Ernests Gulbis reached the quarter finals of the 2008 French Open. Through tournament he beat Simon Greul, seventh seed James Blake, Nicolas Lapentti and home-favourite Michael Llodra. At the quarter final he lost to the third seed Novak Djokovic with 5-7, 63-7, 5-7. Later he reached the third round of the 2008 Queen's Club Championships, beating Kristof Vliegen and 12th seed Andreas Seppi. He lost to 6th seed Andy Murray with 7-5, 1-6, 4-6. At Wimbledon, he lost in the 2nd round to the 2nd seed Rafael Nadal with 5-7, 6-2, 7-62, 6-3. In the first round he defeated John Isner. Davis Cup Gulbis has played in three Davis Cup ties for Latvia this year, winning all seven of the rubbers in which he participated (4 singles; 3 doubles with Deniss Pavlovs). His participation in the tie against Monaco in September helped Latvia to qualify for the Europe/Africa Zone Group I tier of Davis Cup nations for the first time in its history. Playing Style Ernests Gulbis primarily employs an offensive baseline playing style, although is fairly comfortable playing from all court positions. Gulbis' most consistent shot is his forehand, which has been likened to that of American James Blake's for its rapid pace and relatively flat execution; his forehand is taken with a medium swing and with high levels of wrist action, which attributes to the explosive nature of the shot. His arsenal of forehand shots is nearly complete, and thus can be extremely disruptive and turn a defensive position into an offensive position. His running forehand has a slice action, but consistently lands extremely deep in the court, allowing for adequate recoil time to regain court position. Ernests Gulbis also has a particularly excellent array of finesse shots, including the high loband drop shot, both of which he can strike from any position. Gulbis' primary weakness is his backhand, which while remaining adequately deep tends to lack variety, unless a particularly advantageous situation presents itself. Gulbis' foot speed and serve are also only moderate (but have improved significantly), although his rreturn of serve is extremely varied and dangerous, particularly on second serves and, due to his height and kick serves. Despite having prodigious talent for his age, Gulbis can be prone to nervousness when down in a set or match, which can cause tight matches to be more mentally straining on him. Similarly to Marat Safin, Gulbis' playing style is extremely tactical and aggressive, and relies more on making winners than drawing errors, which can sometimes lead to a very high unforced error count. ATP Tour titles Singles (0)
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