Gilles Simon is a famous professional tennis player from France. Finalist of the Davis Cup 2010 in the national team. Winner of 14 ATP titles in singles.
Biography
The future athlete was born in December 1984 on the 27th in the French city of Nice. Like most professional athletes, Simon started training very early. Parents gave the future star to the tennis section at the age of six. In childhood, he trained in Fontaine. After graduation, he entered the National Institute of Sports, which is located on the outskirts of Paris. There he became interested in music and began to play the piano at the conservatory.
Despite his impressive growth (183 cm), in his youth he was much lower than his peers and was very complex about this. Many academy tutors believed that Simon did not shine tennis career. Gilles was inspired by the success of the American athlete Michael Chang, who achieved great heights in tennis and at the same time had a relatively small growth for this sport (170 cm).
Professional career
At professional tennis tournaments, Simon first appeared in 2002. During the season, he won six different tournaments of the ITF series. Two years later, he first got to the ATP tournament, which was held in Metz. The debut at the highest level failed, Gilles lost in the first match to a more experienced opponent Mark Zhikel.
In 2005, the novice athlete won the ATP Challenger and managed to get to the tournament held in Casablanca. In this competition, Simon reached the quarter-final stage. In the spring of that year, the athlete was given a wild card, so he was able to take part in the prestigious Roland Garos tournament. But despite the hopes placed on the athlete, he could not advance further than the first round, where, without much struggle, he lost to the athlete from France Olivier Potiance.
The doubles games were never given to Simon easily, the highest result of which he managed to achieve, was in 2007. Then he took 137th place in the world ranking of tennis players, so far this is the best result of the famous Frenchman. A year later, Gilles also set the best result in a career in singles. Then he took seventh place in the ranking of singles. Today it takes only 55th place in singles and 296th in doubles.
In 2019, Simon continued his career and managed to participate in several significant tournaments, but did not achieve much success. At a tournament in Australia, he reached the semifinals, but missed the victory in the match against a younger and more energetic opponent. At the US Open, Gilles in the second round met with Russian tennis player Andrei Rublev, who confidently outplayed the Frenchman in the first set, after which Simon decided to abandon further participation in the tournament.
