Unlike other tennis professionals, Capriati was notable for her mixture of an outstanding debut, huge pressure, setbacks in her career and an impressive comeback. She entered this sport in 1990 when she turned professional at the very early age of 14 and became one of the biggest talents of the decade.
Teen star rises
After Capriati made her debut, people started talking about her as the best future prospect of her generation. The girl demonstrated a unique attacking game with great power in her strokes, incredible competitiveness and unusual game intensity that attracted all tennis fans. Turning professional in 1990 was also considered a good indicator of her career as it showed that Capriati reached a high level at a young age, but had every chance to remain one of the greatest tennis players in the future.
In general, the best achievements of Capriati include the following:
- turning professional in 1990
- Olympic gold in 1992
- Australian Open championship in 2001
- French Open tournament in 2001
Winning the Olympic gold medal in 1992, Capriati proved her great potential. Indeed, this girl was not just one of the best junior players or a teenager with huge talent. She had been ready to play against the best athletes from around the world at the highest level since an early age, which made all doubts about her disappear.
Setbacks and comeback
Although Jennifer's story has many great moments, there were also several periods when Capriati felt the heavy burden of all expectation and failed to meet it at that point. Such periods are called setbacks and can be connected with injuries or a lack of confidence of a tennis player. Sometimes public opinion becomes a factor in the difficulties in the career of such an athlete who was so popular before this situation. Nevertheless, in most cases, the struggle helps a tennis player to grow mentally and make him or her better afterward.
In Jennifer's case, such a development happened in 2001 when Capriati returned from setbacks and won two championships, which seemed unbelievable at the time. Thus, the Australian Open in 2001 helped people realize what kind of mental abilities she possessed, demonstrating perfect concentration in all her matches even in the hardest competition. The win of the French Open showed Capriati as a real mature champion capable of playing the games tactically correctly without losing patience. Winning two Grand Slams of different surfaces during one season was a great achievement.
Lasting impact
It seems that now nobody disputes the importance of Jennifer's career in tennis as it combined many features which were crucial for such a sport. It shows people how much the young and talented player should prepare herself mentally to overcome all difficulties in the future, how hard it can be to bear all pressure of the fans. In addition, the tennis career of Capriati proves that a great comeback in tennis career is possible and may become an additional reason to success.