On Sunday, July 12th, Italian tennis player Jannik Sinner defeated Alexander Zverev to become a two-time Wimbledon singles winner. But before becoming the #1 male tennis player in the world, before even picking up a tennis racket, Jannik’s main sport was on the snow. Being from the South Tyrol area of Italy, he, like many other children, was primarily a ski racer.
He wasn’t just a skier, though. Jannik was a champion, getting on the snow when he was just around three-years-old and winning top-level national races in his age group. He didn’t start playing tennis at age 7, eventually fully committing to the sport at age 13. He’s noted several reasons for the switch, but most importantly he simply enjoyed the racket sport more.
“In skiing, you have to go downhill for maybe 90 seconds, and if you make one mistake, then it’s over. In tennis, you can play two hours, make many mistakes and still win the match.” – Jannik Sinner
Whatever the cause for the switch, it’s pretty evident that he made the right decision (though who knows how far he could have gone if he stuck with skiing). Sinner is currently ranked #1 in the world, having won five Grand Slam singles titles in his career.
This year so far he’s won 44 singles matches and lost just 3. In his career on the ATP tour, he’s won 365 matches and lost just 89. His combined singles and doubles prize money earned throughout his career is $64,837,801. So sure, he could have been very good at ski racing, but could he have been that good?