Victoria Duval

Duval was born in Miami and spent some of her childhood in Haiti, including time training at the JOTAC Tennis Academy in Port-au-Prince. While living in Port-au-Prince, Duval was robbed at gunpoint and held hostage at her aunt's house at the age of 7. Victoria's mother gave up her neonatal practice and moved Victoria and her two brothers to south Florida. Her father stayed behind to continue the gynecology and obstetrics practice he had helped build in Port-au-Prince.^[1][2]

To continue improving Vicky's tennis game, Nadine moved with her to Atlanta. It was here that she worked with coach Brian de Villiers, at the Racquet Club of the South. In January 2010, Vicky was training in Atlanta when a terrible earthquake struck Haiti and her father was trapped under collapsing walls outside his home for 11 hours. After he regained consciousness, he was able to dig himself out of the rubble. His legs were broken, his left arm was crushed, he had seven fractured ribs puncturing his lungs, and an infection spreading throughout his body. He survived an emergency operation in his own backyard. A wealthy Atlanta family connected to the tennis club donated enough money to have him airlifted to a Fort Lauderdale hospital.^[1][3]

In 2012, Duval played in the Under-18 USTA National Championships as the 17th seed. Despite the low ranking, she won the tournament by defeating Alexandra Kiick in the final. With the title, she earned a wildcard into the main draw of the US Open. Later that summer, she played in the US Open and reached the junior semifinals. In that tournament, Duval knocked out 2012 Wimbledon junior champion Eugenie Bouchard, before falling to Anett Kontaveit.

 

Duval kicked off her 2012 season in May by reaching her first professional final at the $10k tournament in Sumter, South Carolina at the age of 16, where she was defeated by compatriot Louisa Chirico. With a wildcard as the 18s girls' national champion, Duval made her Grand Slam debut at the 2012 US Open. She lost to three-time champion Kim Clijsters in the first round.

The following year, Duval qualified for the US Open and scored a huge upset win over the 2011 champion Samantha Stosur in the first round.^[4] She followed this up with her first career title at an $50k event in Toronto in November.

During the qualifying rounds of Wimbledon in 2014, Duval was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma. Nonetheless, she decided to remain in the tournament, and was able to qualify for the main draw. In the first round, she defeated 29th seed Sorana Cîrstea, before losing to fellow rising star Belinda Bencic. With the strength of her performance at Wimbledon, Duval made her debut in the top 100 of the WTA rankings, at No. 92 in the world. Following the tournament, she proceeded to take the next 13 months off to undergo and recover from chemotherapy treatment.

Duval returned to playing professional matches at an $25k tournament in August 2015. Despite the circumstances of her comeback onto the tour, she was not awarded a wildcard into the US Open. She could have entered the tournament with her protected ranking from the previous year, but elected not to do so after being unsure if she would be ready to play at the time of the entry cutoff five weeks before the start of the event. Instead, Duval opted to play in the qualifying tournament, where she lost in the second round.^[5]

At the start of the 2016 season, Duval replaced an injured Serena Williams at the 2016 Hopman Cup. She represented the United States alongside Jack Sock. Although she lost both of her singles matches, Duval and Sock won two out of their three mixed doubles matches, including a victory over the Czech pair of Karolína Plíšková and Jiří Veselý. A month after the tournament, Duval announced she had knee surgery. She made a brief return for the grass-court season in the middle of the year, but ended up sitting out another ten months afterwards to return to full health.^[6]

After more than two years of intermittently appearing on the tour, Duval returned to playing more regularly on the ITF Circuit starting in April 2017. She had immediate success in her first tournament back, reaching the semifinals at the $80k event in Indian Harbour Beach. Duval again entered the qualifying tournament for the US Open, but had to retire in the final round against good friend and fellow cancer survivor Allie Kiick. A few weeks after the Grand Slam tournament, she reached her first final in over three years at a $25k event. The following month, she reached the biggest final of her career at the Tennis Classic of Macon, losing to former top-30 player Anna Karolína Schmiedlová. With this result, Duval returned to the top 250 in the WTA rankings.

During the 2014 Wimbledon Championships, it was announced that Duval had been diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma. Having decided to remain entered in the tournament, she qualified into the main draw and there upset 29th seed Sorana Cîrstea in a three-set encounter. She subsequently lost in the second round and would return to the United States to undergo treatment.^[7] She completed her chemotherapy and announced in September 2014 that she is cancer free.^[8]

• Victoria Duval at the Women's Tennis Association  
• Victoria Duval at the International Tennis Federation