Patty Schnyder

Infobox Tennis player
playername = Patty Schnyder


country = SUI
residence = Baech, Switzerland | datebirth= birth date and age|df=yes|1978|12|14
placebirth = Basel, Switzerland
height = height|m=1.68
weight = convert|56.6|kg|lb st|abbr=on|lk=on
turnedpro = 1994
plays = Left; Two-handed backhand
careerprizemoney = US$7,387,800
singlesrecord = 501–317
singlestitles = 11 WTA (3 ITF)
retired = "Active"
highestsinglesranking = No. 7 (14 November 2005)
AustralianOpenresult = SF (2004)
FrenchOpenresult = QF (1998, 2008)
Wimbledonresult = 4r (2007)
USOpenresult = QF (1998, 2008)
doublesrecord = 196–204
doublestitles = 5 WTA
highestdoublesranking = No. 15 (6 June 2005)
updated = 6 October 2008

Patty Schnyder (born 14 December 1978, Basel) is professional female tennis player. She has been playing on the WTA tour since the mid-1990s and is a former World "No.7". She has had significant wins over World No. 1s.

During her long career, she has reached four Grand Slam quarterfinals, and one Grand Slam semifinal. She has won 11 WTA singles titles and 5 WTA doubles titles and has made over "$7,000,000" in prize money.

=Career=

In 1996, Schnyder made her Grand Slam debut at the French Open. In 1997, she quickly rose up through the rankings, and by August 1998 she had entered the WTA Top 10. However, Schnyder fell out of the Top 10 in April 1999, and spent the next 6 years ranked in the 15–30 range before re-entering the Top 10 in May 2005.

In December 2003, Schnyder married Rainer Hofmann, a German private investigator and information technology specialist who has accompanied her on the WTA tour since 1999 and became her full-time tennis coach in early 2003. Hofmann carries a fraud conviction in Germany relating to his business dealings with German national communications firm Deutsche Telekom. Hofmann pled guilty in 2002 to embezzling the equivalent of $400,000 from the firm, and was put on probation for 3 years.ref|tennisweek In addition to coaching Schnyder, Hofmann has also worked with some other WTA players in a coaching capacity including Anna Chakvetadze and Sania Mirza.

Schnyder has won 10 singles titles, including a victory in Zurich (Tier I Event) over American Lindsay Davenport, and 4 doubles titles. Her first title on U.S. soil came in August, 2005, when she won at Cincinnati's Western & Southern Financial Group Women's Open. Schnyder is perhaps best known for defeating 4 top 10 players consecutively, including Serena Williams and then-world #1 Jennifer Capriati, in 2002 at the Family Circle Cup in Charleston, which is the largest women-only tennis event held in the United States.

Schnyder's best Grand Slam performance came at the 2004 Australian Open, where she reached thesemifinal before falling to Kim Clijsters. Later that season, she also reached the semi-finals at the Tier 1 tournaments at Charleston and Zurich - two large WTA events where Schnyder has compiled an excellent record through the years.

2005 was Schnyder's most consistent overall season to date. She reached five tour finals, winning two of them (Gold Coast and Cincinnati, both Tier 3 events). She was runner-up at the Tier I events Rome (to Amelie Mauresmo) and Zurich (to Lindsay Davenport). She also reached the final in Linz (Tier 2), falling to Nadia Petrova. She reached the career high of World Number 7 after the end of season WTA Tour Championships. 2006 proved to be a good season for Schnyder also, staying within the top ten and reaching the finals in Charleston (defeating top seed and defending champion Justine Henin in the semis and also to end Henin's 27 match winning streak on clay, though lost to Petrova in the final), and in Stanford (falling to top seed and defending champion Kim Clijsters).

Schnyder had a mediocre year in 2007, where she lost her top 10 ranking. She reached the fourth round of the Australian Open, where she lost to Anna Chakvetadze 6–4, 6–1 after leading 4–1 in the first set. At the French Open, she managed to reach the fourth round, where she had 2 matchpoints against Maria Sharapova but ended up losing 6–3, 4–6, 7–9. At Wimbledon, she was beaten in the fourth round by Justine Henin 6–2, 6–2.At the Acura Classic, she reached the final, beating Elena Dementieva 7–6, 6–0 in the semifinals before again losing to Sharapova in three sets, 2–6, 6–3, 0–6. Schnyder briefly moved up due to this. However at the US Open she lost in the third round to the unseeded Austrian Tamira Paszek in a final set tie break, again wasting leads. After that she played at the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix at Stuttgart, where she fell 0–6 2–6 to Ana Ivanovic. She finished her year with a run to the Generali Ladies Linz final, beating Chakvetadze 6–1, 6–0 in a quarterfinal and Marion Bartoli 7–6, 6–3 in a semifinal, before convincingly losing in the final to Hantuchova 4–6, 2–6.

Schnyder began 2008 by beating Amelie Mauresmo in the quarterfinals of the Mondial Womens' Hardcourts tournament in the Gold Coast before losing to Li Na in the semifinals. At the Australian Open, she lost in the second round to Australian Casey Dellacqua 6–4, 5–7, 6–8, again wasting leads.She then lost in the second round of the Proximus Diamond Games to eventual finalist Karin Knapp, losing in a final set tiebreak. She entered the Qatar Total Open and beat Paszek easily 6–4, 6–0. She lost to Slovakia's Dominika Cibulkova in the second round 6–4 6–3. Next on the calendar for Schnyder will be the Bangalore Open, a Tier II event in Bangalore, India. She defeated Akgul Amanmuradova 4–6, 6–4, 7–6 in the quarterfinals and then managed to beat Zi Yan 6–3, 6–4 in the semifinal. However, she lost to Serena Williams 5–7 3–6 in the final.

Schnyder again lost to Casey Dellacqua in the wimbledon championships in the first round. She played a epic match, but lost 4–6, 6–3, 1–6.

Alongside Emmanuelle Gagliardi, Schnyder will play for her team in the 2008 Summer Olympics according to the [http://www.nbcolympics.com/tennis/insidethissport/qualifications/newsid=145074.html#womens+doubles+olympic+list List of entrants] .

At the US Open, Schnyder was seeded 15th. She beat Katarina Srebotnik in the 4th round to advance to the Quarterfinals where she lost to fifth seeded Elena Dementieva.

At the 2008 Commonwealth Bank Tennis Classic, Schnyder won her first title in over 3 years when she defeated Tamira Paszek in the final 6–3, 6–0.

WTA Tour titles (14)

ingles (11)

Doubles (5)

*A = did not participate in the tournament
*SR = the ratio of the number of singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played
*¹ The Doha tournament achieved Tier I status only in 2008. Zurich and San Diego are no longer Tier I titles.

ources

* cite web|url=http://www.sportsmediainc.net/tennisweek/index.cfm?func=showarticle&newsid=10166&bannerregion=|title=The Tennis Week Interview: Patty Schnyder Hofmann|accessdate=2006-04-17|author=Pagliaro, Richard

External links

* [http://www.patty-schnyder.ch Official website]
* [http://www.patty-schnyder.com/ Official website in English]
* [http://www.the-white-mile.org/ Official website for Patty Schnyder's book]
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