page_title: Elena Vesnina
section_title: 2016: Resurgence in singles, Wimbledon semis; Olympic and WTA Finals doubles champion
hierarchical_section_title: Elena Vesnina / Career / 2016: Resurgence in singles, Wimbledon semis; Olympic and WTA Finals doubles champion
caption_attribution_description: Middle Sunday of Wimbledon 2016.
context_page_description: Elena Sergeyevna Vesnina is an inactive Russian professional tennis player. She is a four-time Grand Slam champion in doubles competition, having won the 2013 French Open, 2014 US Open, and 2017 Wimbledon tournaments with Ekaterina Makarova, and the 2016 Australian Open mixed-doubles title with Bruno Soares. In June 2018, Vesnina was the No. 1 in women's doubles. Her career-high singles ranking is No. 13, achieved in March 2017.
  Vesnina debuted in the main draw of a WTA tournament in Québec. One of her best seasons was in 2009, reaching her first WTA final and attaining a ranking of 24 in the year end. She repeated her success in 2013, reaching her best for a long period ranking of 21 on 22 July. Then she won her first WTA titles in Hobart and Eastbourne. After falling out of the top 100 in October 2014, Vesnina experienced an upturn in fortunes in 2016, making her first Grand Slam semifinal at Wimbledon. She continued her good form into 2017 and won the biggest singles title of her career to date at Indian Wells, claiming her first Premier Mandatory level title.
context_section_description: Vesnina started the year by playing at the Brisbane International. She was the seventh seed for qualifying, and she qualified for the main draw by beating Australian wildcard Tammi Patterson, Mathilde Johansson and Ysaline Bonaventure. In the first round, Vesnina lost to former world No. 1 and eventual champion Victoria Azarenka, in two sets. In doubles, she and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova were the third seeds, and they reached the quarterfinals where they lost to Medina Garrigues and Parra Santonja in a third set super-tiebreak.
  Vesnina failed to reach the main draw of the Australian Open, losing in the first round of qualifying. It marked the time in decade she had failed to qualify for the main draw in a Grand Slam event, her singles ranking dropping to No. 122 in the world. In doubles she and Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova were seeded fifth and reached the quarterfinals where they lost to Alla Kudryavtseva and Vania King. In mixed doubles Vesnina and partner Bruno Soares were also seeded fifth. They reached the final where they defeated CoCo Vandeweghe and Horia Tecău, which marked her first mixed doubles Grand Slam title.
  At the inaugural St. Petersburg Ladies' Trophy, Vesnina received a wildcard for the singles draw and lost in the second round to qualifier Kateryna Kozlova in three sets. She reached the quarterfinals of the doubles draw with Daria Kasatkina, but lost to world No. 1 pairing Hingis/Mirza.
  Vesnina then participated in the Qatar Total Open, where she qualified for the main draw after beating Ons Jabeur and Naomi Broady. She faced Caroline Garcia in the first round, and caused an upset by winning in straight sets. Vesnina then created an even bigger upset by achieving her first top-2 win of her career against Simona Halep in three sets, despite being down 6–7, 1–4. She then caused her third straight upset against former world No. 1 Caroline Wozniacki, once again in three sets. However, her run ended in the quarterfinals after being defeated by eventual champion Carla Suárez Navarro in two tight sets. Nevertheless, this was her best showing at a Premier-5 tournament. In the doubles competition, Vesnina and partner Kasatkina caused a major upset when they ended world No. 1 pairing Hingis/Mirza's 41 match winning streak in the quarterfinals, despite losing the first set 2–6. However, despite winning the first set 6–3 against world No. 2 pairing Chan Hao-ching/Chan Yung-jan, they lost in three sets.
  At the BNP Paribas Open, Vesnina fell in the first round of the qualifying to American wildcard Julia Boserup. In doubles, Vesnina once again partnered Daria Kasatkina but lost in the second round in three sets, despite winning the first set 6–1 to eventual finalists Julia Görges/Karolína Plíšková. In the Miami Open, Vesnina managed to get past qualifying after beating Kateryna Kozlova, avenging her loss in St. Petersburg, and Tsvetana Pironkova. She was drawn to face fellow qualifier Jana Čepelová in the first round and won in straight sets. In the second round, Vesnina caused a huge upset when she beat former world No. 1 and seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams in three sets, despite serving for the match at 6–0, 5–4 and having a match point. Vesnina then faced in-form Britain Johanna Konta but lost in three sets despite being two points from victory. In doubles, Vesnina and Kasatkina fell to two-time Grand Slam champion Bethanie Mattek-Sands/Lucie Šafářová in the second round.
  At the Volvo Car Open, the 85th-ranked Vesnina became the first qualifier to ever reach the championship match in the tournament's 44-year history, where she faced a determined Sloane Stephens. Vesnina won five main draw matches in a row just to reach the finals. However, Stephens ended up prevailing 7–6, 6–2 as the fatigue of 718 minutes – nearly 12 hours – of tournament tennis appeared to take a toll on Vesnina in the second set.
  Vesnina again subdued the qualification, now in Madrid. In every match she performed a bagel (winning a set 6–0), except in the second round, where she fell to Kvitova. In doubles, she and Makarova played th
caption: Vesnina at Wimbledon
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D7100", "Image XResolution": "4000", "Image YResolution": "4000", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Centimeter", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 4.4 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2016:07:07 13:26:04", "Image ExifOffset": "216", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "924", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "13727", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1000", "EXIF FNumber": "71/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "220", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2016:07:03 17:25:04", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2016:07:03 17:25:04", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "1245723/125000", "EXIF ApertureValue": "2827819/500000", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "51/10", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "140", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "30", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "30", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[2, 0, 2, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "210", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0", "EXIF BodySerialNumber": "4506768", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[18, 270, 7/2, 63/10]", "EXIF LensModel": "18.0-270.0 mm f/3.5-6.3"}