RAFAEL NADAL PROFILE

Rafael "Rafa" Nadal Parera is a Spanish professional tennis player currently ranked No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP). He is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time. His success on clay has earned him the nickname "The King of Clay", and has prompted many experts to regard him as the greatest clay court player of all time.Nadal has won nine Grand Slam singles titles, the 2008 Olympic gold medal in singles, a record 18 ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournaments, and also was part of the Spain Davis Cup team that won the finals in 2004, 2008 and 2009. He completed the career Grand Slam by winning the 2010 US Open, being the seventh player in history, and the youngest in the open era, to achieve it. He is the second male player to complete the Career Golden Slam (winner of the four grand slams and the Olympic Gold medal) after Andre Agassi.

Nadal was ranked world No. 2, behind Roger Federer, for a record 160 consecutive weeks before earning the top spot, which he held from 18 August 2008 to 5 July 2009. He regained the world No.1 ranking on 7 June 2010, after winning his fifth French Open title.


Early life
Rafael Nadal was born in Manacor, Majorca, Spain to Sebastián Nadal, a businessman managing his own restaurant, Sa Punta; a glass and window glass company, Vidres Mallorca; and owns an insurance company as well. His mother is Ana María Parera, a housewife. He has a younger sister named María Isabel. His uncle, Miguel Ángel Nadal, is a retired professional footballer, who played for RCD Mallorca, FC Barcelona, and the Spanish national team.Nadal supports football clubs Real Madrid and RCD Mallorca. Recognizing that Nadal had a natural talent for tennis, another uncle, Toni Nadal, a former professional tennis player, introduced him to tennis when he was three years old. Toni has been coaching him ever since. He has not received a single penny for his coaching of Nadal.

At age eight, Nadal won an under-12 regional tennis championship at a time when he was also a promising football player.This made Toni Nadal intensify training, and at that time he encouraged Nadal to play left-handed for a natural advantage on the tennis court, as he noticed Nadal played forehand shots with two hands.When Nadal was 12, he won the Spanish and European tennis titles in his age group and was playing tennis and football all the time.Nadal's father made him choose between football and tennis so that his school work would not deteriorate entirely. Nadal said: "I chose tennis. Football had to stop straight away."

When he was 14, the Spanish tennis federation requested that he leave Mallorca and move to Barcelona to continue his tennis training. Nadal's family turned down this request, partly because they feared it would hurt his education, but also because Toni said that "I don't want to believe that you have to go to America, or other places to be a good athlete. You can do it from your home."The decision to stay home meant that Nadal received less financial support from the federation; instead, Nadal's father covered the costs. In May 2001, he defeated former Grand Slam champion Pat Cash in a clay-court exhibition match.

At 15, he turned pro. Nadal participated in two events on the ITF junior circuit. In 2002, at the age of 16, Nadal reached the semifinals of the Boy's Singles tournament at Wimbledon, in his first ITF junior event.

By the age of 17, he beat Federer the first time they played and became the youngest man to reach the third round at Wimbledon since Boris Becker. At 18, he helped pace Spain over the US in the junior Davis Cup in his second, and final, appearance on the ITF junior circuit. At 19, Nadal won the French Open the first time he played it, a feat not accomplished in Paris for more than 20 years. He eventually won it the first four times he played at Roland Garros. Nadal was ranked in the world's top 50 players. In 2003, he had won the ATP Newcomer of the Year Award. Early in his career, Nadal picked up the trademark habit of biting the trophies he won.

Personal life
Nadal owns an Aston Martin DBS.Nadal lived with his parents and younger sister Maria Isabel, at an age when many tennis stars have long moved out, in a five-story apartment building in their hometown of Manacor, Mallorca. In June 2009 Spanish, newspaper La Vanguardia and then New York Times reported that Nadal's parents, Ana Maria and Sebastian, have separated. This news came after weeks of heated speculation in Internet posts and message boards over Nadal's personal issues as the cause of his setback.Nadal has revealed himself to be Agnostic


PERSONAL INFORMATION

Full name: Rafael Nadal Parera
Country: Spain Spain
Residence: Manacor, Majorca, Spain
Date of birth: 3 June 1986 (1986-06-03) (age 24)
Place of birth: Manacor, Majorca
Height: 1.85 m (6 ft 1 in)
Turned pro: 2001
Plays: Left-handed (two-handed backhand)
Career prize money :$37,684,949

Singles
Career record: 479–103 (82.3%)
Career titles: 43
Highest ranking: No. 1 (18 August 2008)
Current ranking: No. 1 (7 June 2010)

Grand Slam results:
Australian Open W (2009)
French Open W (2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2010)
Wimbledon W (2008, 2010)
US Open W (2010)
Other tournaments
Tour Finals F (2010)
Olympic Games Gold medal.svg Gold medal (2008)

Doubles
Career record 86–52
Career titles 7
Highest ranking No. 26 (8 August 2005)

Grand Slam Doubles results
Australian Open 3R (2004, 2005)
Wimbledon 2R (2005)
US Open SF (2004)