Tracy Austin (born December 12, 1962, in Palos Verdes, California) is a former World No. 1 women's professional tennis player from the United States who won the women's singles title at the US Open in 1979 and 1981 and the mixed doubles title at Wimbledon in 1980, before a series of injuries cut short her career. Career As a junior player, Tracy Austin won 21 age-group titles, including the U.S. national 12-and-under title at age 10 in 1972. In 1977, she became the youngest player to win a professional tournament, capturing the title in Portland, Oregon aged 14 years and 28 days. Later that year, she made her Grand Slam debut at Wimbledon, losing to Chris Evert in the third round. At the U.S. Open two months later, she reached the quarterfinals, losing to Betty Stove. Austin became the youngest-ever U.S. Open champion in 1979, aged 16 years and 9 months. In the final, she faced Evert who was bidding to win the title for the fifth consecutive year. Austin won the match 64, 63. Earlier that year, Austin had ended Evert's 125-match winning streak on clay by beating her in three sets in a semifinal of the Italian Open. Tracy Austin was a singles semifinalist at Wimbledon in both 1979 (losing to Martina Navratilova) and 1980 (losing to Evonne Goolagong Cawley).
After missing the early months of 1981 to chronic injuries, Tracy Austin returned to the tour in the summer and put the disappointment of a Wimbledon loss to Pam Shriver behind her. First, she beat both Navratilova and Evert to win the Canadian Open in Toronto and then won the U.S. Open again in a close final against Navratilova 16, 76(4), 76(1). In 1980, Austin won the Wimbledon mixed doubles title with her brother John. Austin was ranked the World No. 1 singles player at times during 1980, breaking Evert's and Navratilova's six year monopolization of the top spot. During that year, Austin captured the two sponsors' tour-ending events, defeating Navratilova to win the Avon Championships in March and Andrea Jaeger to capture the last Colgate Series Championships in January 1981. Tracy Austin repeated her success at the sponsors' year ending events by winning the Toyota Series Championships in December 1981, defeating Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova in back-to-back matches. Her 61, 62 semifinal defeat of Evert was her last career victory over her arch rival. (Evert had defeated Austin in an earlier round robin match at that tournament 46, 64, 76, and then blamed her semifinal loss to Austin on exhaustion.)
Tracy Austin began her first comeback on the tour in 1988 when she played in seven doubles tournaments and 1989 when she played in one doubles and two singles tournaments. This comeback was ended by a near-fatal motor vehicle accident. She attempted a second comeback in 1993 and 1994 but was not particularly successful. In 1992, Austin became the youngest person to be inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame. Since retiring as a player, Austin has worked frequently as a commentator for NBC and the USA Network. She worked for the Seven Network at the 2006, 2007 and 2008 Australian Open and usually participates in the BBC's Wimbledon coverage. Family Tracy's older sister, Pam, and her older brother, Jeff, were also professional tennis players, as were brothers Doug and John Austin. She is the sister-in-law of fitness author Denise Austin. She is married to Scott Holt and is the mother of three sons. Trivia Tracy Austin was the first opponent of Steffi Graf when the German made her professional debut at the Porsche Classic in Stuttgart in 1982. Austin defeated the 13-year-old Graf 64, 60. Their paths crossed again twelve years later in 1994 at the Indian Wells tournament when Austin, in the middle of her comeback, played Graf, who was World No. 1 at the time. This proved to be another lopsided encounter with Graf blanking Austin 60, 60. Grand Slam singles finals Wins |
