Roger Federer

The current number one world tennis champion, Roger Federer, was born in August 8, 1981 in Basel, Switzerland. Roger grew up in a town named Munchenstein in Switzerland, ten minutes outside of Basel. He only picked up a racquet when he was six. In Roger's family, tennis was quite a passion, though Roger was the only one who showed great talent in the game. He was so good that he got into Basel's crack junior program at the age of eight.

Roger's first hero in the sporting world was Boris Becker, a young German tennis player who won Wimbledon in 1985. He also liked soccer and was quite talented at it, and had thought of becoming a professional, but decided to take on tennis.

As a child, Roger (as he stated himself) was a "hothead". He would throw his racquet after a bad shot and would only get annoyed with himself, not with the linesman, umpire or opponent. In a tournament, his parents were to embarrass to talk to him after an explosion of anger, which annoyed him even more.

An Australian coach named Peter Carter came to Switzerland who started to coach Roger. He worked on perfecting his shots and taught him mental strategies and psychology, to help him stop smashing his racquet. Over time, Roger eventually stopped.

At age fourteen, Roger decided to take his invitation to go to Switzerland's national training centre. He left on Sunday nights and came back on the weekends. Though he was upset because everyone in the training centre spoke French and he spoke German.

Four years later, Roger had become one of the best teenage junior tennis players and won junior Wimbledon singles and doubles, the Orange Bowl in Florida but lost in the finals of the junior U.S open.

Roger wanted to aim to become the fourth tennis player to win the junior Wimbledon and then go on to win the seniors. Therefore, he decided to join the men's tennis tour in 1998.

By 1999, Roger was beginning to do really well in the men's tour. For example, he beat the number five player at the time. By the end of the year, Roger was inside the top 100 and was the youngest player as well.

In 2000, he made it to the Semi-finals at the Sydney Olympics, but just missed out on getting a bronze medal. He ended the year ranked 29th.

2001 brought Roger his first win in Milan, in February. He then made his biggest win by defeating 7 time winning Wimbledon champion, Pete Sampras, stopping his 31 match winning streak. He then lost in the Quarter-finals, finishing his year ranked 13th.

By the end of 2002, Roger was now ranked number 6 in the world. He played a tournament, which he then made it to the Semi-finals but lost to Lleyton Hewitt, who then went on to win the tournament.

In July 2003, Roger made his biggest win so far in his career. He had finally won Wimbledon and was now number 2 in the world.

2004 was where Roger begun his number 1 ranking and started to become the Roger we know. He won the Australian Open, followed by another win at Wimbledon and then won the U.S open, but failed to win the Roland Garos (French Open).

In 2005, Roger sadly lost the Australian Open in a long fought match that lasted more than four hours. He then again won Wimbledon followed by the U.S open still ranked number 1.

2006 was another Australian Open, Wimbledon and U.S Open win but lost again in the Roland Garos and 2007 was the same.

This year (2008), Roger fought well but lost in the Semi-finals of the Australian Open - but Roger's year isn't over - it has just begun.