Bjrn Borg Ethnicity - Bjrn Borg Net Worth Bjrn Borg Ethnicity Read more... Bjrn Borg Bjrn Borg Net Worth is $28.5 Million. What is Bjorn Borg's net worth? Bjorn Borg's net worth is $28.5 million dollars. Born in Sodertalje, Sweden, Bjorn Borg enjoyed playing tennis and hockey as a child, and adapted some of his hockey style to his. ... Bjrn Borg Net Worth is $28.5 Million. Bjrn Borg Net Worth is $28.5 Million. What is Bjorn Borg's net worth? Bjorn Borg's net worth is $28.5 million dollars. Born in Sodertalje, Sweden, Bjorn Borg enjoyed playing tennis and hockey as a child, and adapted some of his hockey style to his ... Bjrn Borg winning Wimbledon in 1980, and his Borg Diadoras. Composite: John Ly/Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Museum/Getty Chuck Taylor, for instance, instigated several improvements to the performance of All Stars greater flexibility, a heel patch for ankle ...

Posted: September 20, 2016, 3:40 pm Björn Borg drops undies in North Korea In October Swedish brand Björn Borg pledged to drop 450 pairs of undies onto one city in the world, and when the Pyongyang won the vote the underwear king went undercover to get the job done. The focal point of Björn Borg’s autumn campaign ‘Björn ... Posted: November 19, 2013, 8:47 am Vivid Skivvies Branding Top model Harry Goodwins fronts the latest ad campaign for Swedish underwear brand Björn Borg. Harry poses in studio while sporting a bevy of the label's brightly hued boxer and vividly printed brief designs. Evoking both a fun and carefree air ... Posted: May 20, 2013, 5:00 pm I looked hilarious." Celebrity photographer Atul Kasbekar wrote: "#WhenIWas13 I wanted to be Bjrn Borg and Sunil Gavaskar rolled into one. My wish came true - I played tennis ball cricket". Composer Salim Merchant shared: "#WhenIWas13 I wanted to start my ...

Posted: July 19, 2016, 5:00 pm Bjorn Borg | Overview | ATP World Tour | Tennis ATP World Tour Prize Money Singles & Doubles combined Head2Head Player Galleries AFP/Getty Images Albert Ramos Viñolas recibió el trofeo en el SkiStar Swedish Open 2016 a manos del ex número uno Bjorn Borg. SkiStar Swedish Open Bjorn Borg, el campeón en 1974, 1978-70, llegó a Bastad el jueves. Él entregará el trofeo después de la final el domingo Getty Images La leyenda del tenis Bjorn Borg asiste a la semifinal de Wimbledon. Getty Images Bjorn Borg, who made his first appearance at Wimbledon in 1973, won 41 straight matches and five titles at The Championships.

ATP Premier Partner Bjorn Borg: 'Tennis is one of the cleanest sports' - CNN.com Bjorn Borg: 'Tennis is one of the cleanest sports' By Sophie Eastaugh, for CNN Updated 1709 GMT (0109 HKT) May 25, 2016 Chat with us in Facebook Messenger. Find out what's happening in the world as it unfolds. Story highlights Bjorn Borg: Tennis is "one of the cleanest sports" "Tennis has been very protected for many years," adds Borg Spoke to CNN Open Court's Pat Cash Swede is an 11-time grand slam winner (CNN) It's been a trying start to the year for tennis, with match-fixing allegations and Maria Sharapova's failed drugs test putting the sport into the headlines for all the wrong reasons. Despite these controversies, in a rare interview with CNN Open Court, Swedish tennis great Bjorn Borg said the game still shapes up to be "one of the cleanest sports." Follow @cnnsport "Sooner or later [this] would come up in tennis too," the 11-time grand slam winner told CNN's Pat Cash on Tuesday.

"I think tennis has been very protected for many years." "Slowly it's been coming ... [there have been] illegal things in other sports. I'm not surprised that this happened in tennis," he said. Bjorn Borg and CNN's Pat Cash One sport mired in doping allegations is athletics. Last week it emerged the FBI and federal prosecutors are investigating allegations of widespread doping by Russian athletes. Read More "When it comes up it's always a big question mark. But I think it's good; I know that they check the players regularly," added Borg, referring to tennis' anti-doping program. "All these question marks, they have to solve those, but I think tennis is one of the cleanest sports anyway." 'It's good it came up' JUST WATCHED MUST WATCH What do Maria Sharapova's chocolates taste like? 02:37 Widely considered to be one of the greatest tennis players of all time, Borg said these issues offered the sport an opportunity to look at its regulatory policies. "We want to protect our sport," he said. "We love our sport, so we want it to be clean.

In one way it's good it came up so they can solve the problems [that] are in the sport right now." Andy Murray edges Radek Stepanek in French Open Borg dominated tennis during the 1970s, winning five consecutive Wimbledon championships and six French Opens before retiring at the age of 26. Now 59, he spoke to fellow Wimbledon champion Pat Cash in Stockholm for CNN Open Court, due to air in June. Visit CNN's Open Court page for more tennis news Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Andy Murray had quite a mane back in 2008, as evidenced by this image of him competing at the Australian Open that year. Hide Caption 1 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Pictured here in 1998 tennis legend Andre Agassi rocked long hair for many years. In his autobiography "Open" the star wrote that his long hairdo during the 1990s was actually a wig. Hide Caption 2 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Eight years later he waved to the crowd after his last Wimbledon appearance -- losing to the up-and-coming Rafael Nadal.

Hide Caption 3 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Australia's rising star Nick Kyrgios likes to keep his hair short too -- with a snazzy twist. Hide Caption 4 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's For Dustin Brown, dreadlocks are the way to go -- the German is pictured here at the 2013 Wimbledon Championships. Hide Caption 5 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's A young Boris Becker sporting a floppy fringe. In 1985, the German became the youngest-ever Wimbledon men's singles champion, aged just 17 years old. Hide Caption Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's As Becker's career progressed, so did his hairstyles. Hide Caption 7 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Back in 2002, Roger Federer liked the ponytail look but has since opted for shorter locks. Hide Caption Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's Five-time Wimbledon champion Bjorn Borg was so talented he even made the mullet look cool.

Hide Caption 9 of 10 Photos: Tennis' hairdos and dont's The Swede's great rival John McEnroe could have perhaps applied his most famous phrase -- "you cannot be serious" -- to his hairstyles when he was a player. Hide Caption 1980: The War of 18-16: Borg and McEnroe's Wimbledon Classic | TENNIS.com 1980: The War of 18-16: Borg and McEnroe's Wimbledon Classic Tags: 50th Anniversary Moments , Bjorn Borg , John McEnroe Borg won Wimbledon for the fifth straight year with a 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7(16), 8-6 finish over McEnroe. (AP) This year marks the 50th anniversary of TENNIS Magazine's founding in 1965. To commemorate the occasion, we'll look back each Thursday at one of the 50 moments that have defined the last half-century in our sport. The 1980 Wimbledon men’s final made tennis history even before a ball was hit.

It was the first time that anyone at the All England Club could remember boos—a “cacophony” of them, according to one writer—raining down from the normally respectful Centre Court audience as the players walked out to play a championship match. They were raining on one player, to be precise, and he was unlike any that Wimbledon had seen in its 104-year history. Twenty-one-year-old John McEnroe , the bellicose, frizzy-haired New Yorker known to the London tabloids as Superbrat, was making his debut in the final. There he would face the four-time defending champion, Bjorn Borg , the stoical, long-haired Swede who had once been known to those same tabloids as the Teen Angel. Their respective nicknames gave you a pretty good idea of who the fans at Wimbledon were rooting for that day. Borg and McEnroe—righty vs. lefty, defender vs. attacker, ice vs. fire, machine vs. mad genius, civilization vs. its discontents—was a rivalry made in tennis heaven.

While the two would face each other just 14 times over the course of four seasons, splitting those matches 7-7, they became the standard by which the sport’s future duels would be measured. It was against Borg that McEnroe had made his impudent entrance onto the world tennis stage. In 1978, as an 18-year-old, he strode into Borg’s home arena, in Stockholm, and stunned the world’s best player in straight sets in front of the country's king; up to that point, Borg had never lost to a younger player. It was also against Borg that McEnroe would fulfill his vast promise for the first time, by raising his game to a place where even the Swede couldn’t follow in their Wimbledon and U.S. Open finals of 1981. McEnroe was so brilliant in those matches that Borg left the sport entirely rather than try to challenge him again. With his retirement from Grand Slam tennis in ’81, the first great period of the Open era would come to a sudden close. But July 5, 1980, belonged to Borg, and this is the one match of theirs that tennis fans remember and celebrate to this day.

That’s partly because it’s the one where the angel triumphed over the devil, and tennis fans got what they wanted. It’s also because, in its setting, its place in time, its wooden racquets, colorful headbands, short shorts, and wild hair, the 1980 Wimbledon final serves as a poignant reminder of a golden era now long past, when tennis reached a peak of popularity and cultural influence it would never reach again. The match took place 12 years after the beginning of Open tennis, and in many ways its two protagonists could be seen as shining, wealthy examples of how successful the transition from amateur to professional had been. Borg, along with Jimmy Connors, was the first pure product of the pro game. After bolting school at 15, he signed with burgeoning U.S. talent agency IMG. The company moved the Swedish teen to tax-free Monte Carlo, then proceeded to make him the richest player, and one of the richest athletes, in history. From clothes to racquets to beer to breakfast cereal, Borg, an international symbol of gentlemanly excellence, with a playboy’s mystique to match, was the perfect pitchman for just about anything. He made tennis synonymous with the endorsement deal.

At Wimbledon in 1980, it appeared that McEnroe was no match for his more-popular rival when it came to endorsements potential. In reality, though, Superbrat was a step ahead in the sponsorship game. Three years earlier, McEnroe’s first appearance at Wimbledon had coincided with the All England Club debut of another ambitious young American, Phil Knight, founder of Nike. Knight watched as the 18-year-old tore through his opponents, and every official he encountered, on his way to the semifinals. The English may not have liked what they saw from Johnny Rotten, but Knight did. He would soon sign McEnroe to a shoe contract, and pioneer the concept of the athlete as countercultural rebel. And then there was the tennis. This classic contrast in styles lasted for nearly four hours, and escalated in drama and quality with each passing game. Borg was a notorious slow starter, but he outdid himself on this day, listlessly flipping easy balls into the net on his way to a 6-1 first-set loss—midway through, he could still be seen stretching his legs.

But while McEnroe was confident of his chances against him on grass, he wasn’t quite free of the Angelic Assassin’s mystique just yet; Borg was, after all, a childhood hero of his, and someone who had taken the younger player under his wing in his early years on tour. The American left the door ajar at the end of the second set just long enough for Borg to knife his way through with a couple of pinpoint passing shots. His teeth into the match at last, Borg didn’t appear that he would let go. He won the third set quickly, and struck again for what looked like the final service break late in the fourth. But McEnroe produced a scintillating series of shots of his own to break back. While it wouldn’t be enough to win him this match, after that game he knew what he was capable of, and that one of the things he was capable of was beating Borg on a stage like this one. Superbrat and the Assassin proceeded to a fourth-set tiebreaker.

Wimbledon, after reluctantly installing Jimmy Van Alen’s match-shortening system a few years earlier when a set reached 8-8, had joined the rest of the world in 1979 and started using it at 6-6. If Borg were to win this one, he would become the first man to win Wimbledon in a tiebreaker (Evonne Goolagong had broken that barrier on the women’s side the previous day). The thought of it may have made the ghosts of Wimbledon balk: This would become the breaker that would never end, and which Borg couldn’t win. It was also one of the greatest passages of tennis ever played. Over the first four sets, the two men hadn’t come up with their best at the same time: For the next 34 points, in what would become known as The War of 18-16, they did. McEnroe saved five match points, while Borg saved an equal number of set points. Every shot was tracked down, every stroke of brilliance topped by another, every superb approach beaten by a better pass. Finally, with the tension as high as it had ever been inside the 58-year-old Centre Court, it ended in anti-climax.

At 16-17, Borg plunked a drop shot into the bottom of the net. The Ice Man, it seemed, had finally cracked. McEnroe was sure that he would be the new Wimbledon champion. Fourteen games and one more unthinkable reversal later, though, it was Borg who assumed his familiar victory pose—knees on the ground, hands held out prayerfully before him—for a fifth straight year, with a 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (16), 8-6 win. Instead of melting, he had fired up his serve as never before; he lost just two points in his seven service games in the final set. McEnroe, so sure of a win a few minutes earlier, could only look on in awe at Borg’s psychological reserves. Yet in winning that fabled fourth-set tiebreaker, McEnroe had also learned something about his own potential that day, and he would soon show Borg and the world how far it could take him. Perhaps the fans at Wimbledon had an inkling of it already. The same people who had booed him as he walked on, gave him a rousing ovation as he walked off.

The haunted champion | Express Yourself | Comment | Daily Express VIDS The haunted champion BJORN Borg made a rare appearance at Sunday’s Wimbledon final looking sad, lonely and a shadow of the pin-up tennis star. But here we reveal how after 20 years of humiliation he has rebuilt his life... 00:00, Tue, Jul 10, 2007 Legend: Bjorn Borg It was a most poignant scene. The place: just outside the men’s locker room at Wimbledon’s famed Centre Court. The time: Sunday, right after the men’s singles final. Bjorn Borg, winner of the most coveted title in tennis for five years running, stood facing Roger Federer, the man who had just equalled his record. The two champions, past and present, embraced warmly – the old lion ceding to the young cub. There was a striking symmetry to the meeting. Federer is 25, exactly the age Borg was when at his peak in the late Seventies. Both are reserved men from supposedly “boring” countries - Switzerland in Federer’s case, Sweden for Borg. Borg in his heyday Borg retired from tennis when he was just 26, in July 1981.

A month later, Federer, the man who has now inherited his mantle, was born. But according to one source, who has known the Swede since he first burst on to Wimbledon as a 17-year-old, this was not how Borg would have liked it to be. “Speaking to his wife on Saturday, she said what he really wanted to do was walk out on to Centre Court alone and do a lap of honour, either before the match or after it. “Wimbledon means more to him than anywhere else and winning Wimbledon meant more to him than winning anywhere else. But the people who run the tournament don’t like breaking with tradition. They don’t like anything that might upstage the royals. All I did was practice, eat and sleep. Bjorn Borg “They also said Borg would upstage the winner. So that’s why Borg and Federer ended up having their encounter in private.” Borg did make it on to Centre Court that day but in the company of two of his greatest rivals, John McEnroe and Jimmy Connors. Why the other two – great tennis champions though they are – accompanied the Swede is unclear.

He is, after all, the “ice-borg”, the coolest (in every sense), most unflappable player who ever wielded a tennis racket, the man who reacted to a point won or lost in exactly the same manner – with an impassive stare from those close-set eyes. One explanation for the presence of McEnroe and Connors was that life has been so tough on Borg since he quit tennis suddenly in 1981 that he ­simply did not have the confidence to step out alone and needed his old foes for support. Others say he felt snubbed at not being allowed his lap of honour. Whatever the reason, there was an undeniable air of melancholy about Borg as he acknowledged the applause of the crowd. “He looked somehow sad and wistful,” said one observer. “Maybe he was ­simply pondering the cruel passing of time or maybe he was wondering what might have happened if he hadn’t left tennis. He is, after all, the archetypal melancholy Swede.” It was only the second time Borg had come to Wimbledon since retiring from tennis.

He never used the free tickets allocated to past winners and did not take up the standing invitation from the All England Club to sit in the Royal Box. He made one exception, in 2000, to take part in the champions’ parade and got an ecstatic reception from the crowd. This year’s invitation came from the All England Club too but whatever Borg’s inner thoughts were on Sunday, one thing is, as he would say in his idiosyncratic English, “for sure”: his life off the court has been far more turbulent that it ever was on it. While his progression through tennis was seamless – winning junior Wimbledon at 15, reaching the quarter-finals of the adult tournament at 16, winning his first Grand Slam title at the French Open at 17 – real life has always been liber­ally scattered with pitfalls. Acknowledging his own ill-preparedness for life outside tennis, Borg said this year: “If someone had said to me while I was playing tennis, ‘Look, I have this problem in my life’ I would not have known what they meant by that, not really. When you play at that level, you don’t have problems. Everything was done for me.

All I did was follow my schedule: practice, eat, sleep. I lived in a kind of vacuum.” Without the support system of coaches and personal assistants, dieticians, chefs, etc, Borg’s life went into virtual freefall. He left his first wife (and teenage sweetheart), Roman­ian tennis player Mariana Simionescu, had a fling and a child by a teenage model he met while judging a wet T-shirt contest, got married again, unwisely, to an Italian nude model-turned-pop singer, launched a clothing company which went belly-up, trusted too many wrong people and lost a good deal of money. In the midst of it all, in 1989, he was rushed to hospital and had his stomach pumped after what was reported as a suicide attempt by taking an overdose. Borg has always denied this strenuously, saying he got severe food poisoning. But it didn’t help his increasingly bonkers image when he attempted a comeback two years later by entering the Monte Carlo Open in 1991.

He turned up with his old-fashioned, small-headed ­wooden racket (everyone else was playing with graphite rackets with giant heads by then) and with a 79-year-old Welsh martial arts expert named Tai Honsai (aka Ronald Thatcher) for a coach. Borg was promptly slaughtered by a journeyman Spaniard and went on to lose every one of the other 11 matches he played before bowing out of tennis again in 1993. Why would Borg, winner of 11 Grand Slam titles (five Wimble­dons and six French Opens – the latter a record still unequalled today) put himself through such humiliation unless he needed the money? He protested that he simply “wanted to try tennis again and see how far I get” but nobody really believed him, especially as he’d had to sell off his speedboat and cash in three life insurance policies to pay off his business debts. The Swedish government was also pursuing him for £30,000 in back tax and in 1997 Borg faced bankruptcy over debts of close to £1million. In 2005 Bonhams the auctioneers announced a sale of Borg’s Wimble­don trophies.

John McEnroe was one of several players who phoned to ask what on earth he thought he was doing. But he was the one who persuaded Borg to think again (and one can imagine how). People offered to help him financially, assuming he must be in dire need. He is adamant that he wasn’t but that, since he never displayed his trophies, he thought he might as well have a clear-out. After McEnroe’s intervention, Borg re-acquired his trophies. To those who have grown up in this age of instant celebrity, it is hard to explain just how staggeringly famous Bjorn Borg was. Not just as a tennis player but as a fully fledged star with teeny-bop fans screaming at the gate and groupies smuggling themselves into his hotel. Borg had the looks – long, blond hair – and the pin-up body. He also had an extraord­inar­ily low pulse rate of 38 beats per minute, which meant that as well as playing tennis superlatively for hours at a time he was also a long-distance athlete in the bedroom too. “He used to have this fat Italian minder called Bambino,” says a long-time member of the tennis scene.

“Bjorn would pick out the girl he fancied and Bambino would arrange for her to be brought to his room.” In 1981 Borg lost his Wimbledon title to John McEnroe. A month later McEnroe beat him again in the US Open. Borg didn’t bother staying for the award ceremony. He went straight from the court to the airport and flew out of New York, announcing his retirement a few days later. “Tennis,” he said, “just wasn’t fun any more”. Nor, one must presume, was coming second after so many years of being No 1. McEnroe was distraught; the bad boy of tennis was always better-behaved when playing against Borg. “McEnroe respected Borg hugely and Borg knew how to calm him down,” says Daily Express tennis correspondent Nigel Clarke. “Once when McEnroe went off on a rant, Borg said to him, ‘John, it’s just a tennis match. It doesn’t matter’. And McEnroe looked as if he had just realised a great truth.” During tournaments Borg followed a strict routine: no shaving and no sex.

But with no tournaments to curtail his wandering eye, his marriage to Mariana ended in 1984 when he fell for Jannicke Bjorling, a 17-year-old nurse who was also a contestant in the wet T-shirt contest he was judging in Stockholm. She bore him a son, Robin, now 21, but they split four years later amid much acrimony. Then came his second marriage to Italian Loredana Berte, 14 years his senior, who allegedly attempted suicide during their marriage. It was during this period that his fashion com­pany, Bjorn Borg Design, went bust. Today at 51, Borg looks little different from the man who graced Wimbledon so magnificently. The hair is rather more silvery than golden, the narrow eyes more deep-set but he can still play eight hours of tennis and is a regular – with his old pal McEnroe – on the veterans’ circuit. He has re-launched his business, selling upmarket underwear, and is happily married to third wife Patricia Ostfeldt. They have a three-year-old son, Leo. Life, it seems, is as good as it was in his tennis glory days, except without the madness.

Or as happy as it can be for a melancholy Swede. Björn Borg Björn Borg 11-time major champion and five-time finalist Career Titles Member of the Swedish Davis Cup Team 1972-1975, 1978-1980 Member of the 1975 Swedish Championship Davis Cup Team Overall Record: 45-11 Citizenship: SWE Born: June 6, 1956 in Sodertaljie, Sweden Played: Right-handed Björn Borg was a rock ‘n roll star draped in tennis clothes. His massive appeal, based not only on his extraordinary tennis ability, but on his good looks and shy manner, made him a worldwide tennis teen idol. “He was like the Beatles for God’s sake,” said Ingrid Lofdahl-Bentzer, a close Borg friend. Borg polarized tennis in the 1970s. Known as the “ice man” for his frosty temperament on court – never, ever letting his opponent get a hint of what was boiling inside him – Borg was the epitome of cool.

Everything from the way he walked onto the court, to his long hair that flowed to his shoulders, to the headbands he always wore, to his Donnay racquet that featured a longer leather handle to accommodate his two-handed backhand, created hysteria. He was tennis’s biggest drawing card. It was called “Borgmania.” You’d have to search sporting annals long and hard to find an athlete in any sport that rose to meteoric heights like Borg, an 11-time major singles champion in just seven years (1974-81), who dramatically stunned and shocked the tennis world by retiring at age 26. Even in such a short time span, Borg left an indelible legacy on tennis history. He won six French Open championships (second best in history behind Rafael Nadal’s nine) and a record four consecutively (1978-81).

Borg dominated Wimbledon like no other player since Willie Renshaw did when he won six straight championships (1881-1886), capturing five consecutive titles from 1976 to 1980, his five-set marathon victory over John McEnroe in 1980 considered one of the greatest tennis matches in history. Borg’s five titles at Wimbledon are the third highest in history behind Pete Sampras and Roger Federer who have seven each. Borg’s name stands alone in a half dozen all-time best tennis records: He won 89.8 percent of his major matches; won three of his 11 major titles without losing a set (1976 Wimbledon, 1978 French, 1980 French), captured three consecutive channel slams (French and Wimbledon) from 1978-80 and had 14 consecutive victories in major semifinals. At Wimbledon, his 92.7 winning percentage based on a 51-4 record from 1973-81 won’t likely ever be broken, nor will his 41 consecutive match winning streak achieved from 1976-81.

He reeled off a 49-2 (96 percent) winning streak at the French Open, second best to Nadal, a position he firmly holds. He was born in Sodertaljie, an industrial town 20 miles outside of Stockholm. His tennis career began inauspiciously. His father had won a table tennis tournament when Borg was age 8. In the options of available prizes, young Björn asked his father to choose a tennis racquet. The very next day he was playing tennis with his friends and said he “loved the game from the beginning … from the first ball [he] hit.” A garage door was Borg’s first opponent; he would spend hours pounding the ball against an object that would become as unyielding as the Swede himself. Borg’s parents never pushed him into competitive tennis, it was solely his decision. “When I was eight or nine years old, I had two dreams,” Borg said. “One to be part of the Swedish Davis Cup team and the second to play on Wimbledon Centre Court.” Dreams do come true. He achieved both.

Five Wimbledon Gentlemen Singles Championships would follow and in 1975 Borg led his small Nordic country to the Davis Cup championship at Kings Hall in Stockholm, the very same venue where he began playing tennis, with a 3-2 victory over Czechoslovakia. It was the first time in the 75 year history of the Davis Cup that a country other than Britain, France, Australia, or the United States had won the cup. The unorthodox strokes that enamored Borg to worldwide audiences were rooted in his game from the outset, and caught the attention of the Swedish Tennis Federation. While his strokes lacked style, his footwork was extraordinary. In 1971 at age 15, Borg connected with longtime coach and mentor Lennart Bergelin, who as Davis Cup Captain selected the scrawny and athletically raw teenager to play on Sweden’s Davis Cup team the following year. Bergelin, who passed away in November 2008, was an integral part of Borg’s stardom. In 1972, prior to Davis Cup play, Borg made his presence known by winning the prestigious Orange Bowl in Miami over Vitas Gerulaitis in the boys’ under-18 final.

In 1973, as the No. 6 Borg made his professional debut at Wimbledon, losing in a five-set quarterfinal match to Brit Roger Taylor. Less than a year later, at the 1974 French Open, Borg became the youngest champion in history, when as an 18-year-old he defeated Spain’s Manuel Orantes in devastating fashion after dropping the first two sets, 2-6, 6-7, 6-0, 6-1, 6-1. Compatriot Mats Wilander swiped that distinction as a 17-year-old in 1982, and then was surpassed by a younger Michael Chang in 1989. It was the first of six championships for Borg in Paris, the second coming consecutively in 1975 when as the No. 1 seed he throttled Argentine Guillermo Vilas, 6-2, 6-3, 6-4. Borg reeled off four straight French Open championships in 1978, 1979, 1980, and 1981.

He defeated Vilas again in 1978 (6-1, 6-1, 6-3), Victor Pecci of Paraguay in 1979 (6-3, 6-1, 6-7, 6-4), Vitas Gerulaitis in 1980 (6-4, 6-1, 6-2), and Ivan Lendl in a five-set struggle in 1981 (6-1, 4-6, 6-2, 3-6, 6-1). Borg’s heavy topspin forehand and two-handed backhand became the craze. Everyone from recreational players to touring pros tried to emulate the style – not only in Borg’s stroke production, but how he comported himself on court with a controlled, emotionalist demeanor – but no one could come close. “He had this thing about him that was inexplicable,” said John McEnroe in the HBO documentary McEnroe/Borg: Fire & Ice. “I don’t know what it is, why it is, but is it. Certain people have this incredible aura that I can’t explain without having to do anything.

It’s like he got into his superman outfit … I did try in practice just for the hell of it, to be like that, but I couldn’t do it in practice, so I wasn’t going to waste my time in a match trying to be like he was. I felt like letting things out was healthier than keeping things in.” Said Borg, “They didn’t really know what I was thinking or how I was feeling, if I am laughing or crying or disappointed or happy, they don’t know that because I kept it all to myself. That didn’t mean I wasn’t boiling inside, but I would never let anyone see that.” Borg’s western grip, which he used on both sides, was unnatural, but it produced wicked topspin. The grip limited his volleying proficiency, though he often released his left hand when at net, but made his baseline game explosive. His topspin groundstroke game was potent and forceful – his backhand resembling a hockey slap shot – and a Borg hit ball would jump off the court like it was on fire and looking for water. While other pros dabbled in topspin play, Borg turned it into an art form on every single shot.

No one strung their racquets as tightly as Borg: they had a distinct musical ping when strung to his demanding perfection. The small and thin 15-year-old filled out proportionally as an 18-year-old, his shoulders strong and broad and his legs thick and muscular. He played with stamina and endurance, and when combined with his steely focus, made Borg virtually unbeatable, which his statistical records confirm. “I want to win every single point from the first minute to the last minute,” Borg said. “When I am playing, I am 100 percent serious.” Borg took that stern approach to new levels at Wimbledon, where he became a five-time champion from 1976-81. The surface wasn’t natural for Borg in his first foray in 1973, but he adapted quickly.

His first title in 1976 was impressive, 6-4, 6-2, 9-7 over Ilie Năstase, who assessed Borg’s game by saying, “We’re playing tennis, and he’s playing something else.” Borg disposed of Jimmy Connors (3-6, 6-2, 6-1, 5-7, 6-4) in 1977 and again in 1978 (6-2, 6-2, 6-3). He defeated the big-serving Roscoe Tanner in 1979 (6-7, 6-1, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4) and in 1980 defeated McEnroe, who was playing in his first-ever Wimbledon final, in an epic match, 1-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-7 (16-18), 8-6. The 34-point tiebreaker that decided the fourth set, saw McEnroe thwart off five match points and Borg stave off six set points himself before McEnroe prevailed to force a fifth set.

“There’s a magic when our names are mentioned together,” said McEnroe “We brought tennis to a place it wasn’t at before.” “It’s a match I will remember for the rest of my life,” Borg said of the 4 ½ hour classic. In 1981, Borg was attempting to erase the 100-year Wimbledon record held by Renshaw and win his sixth straight. He and McEnroe played another match for the ages in the finals, but outcome was reversed, McEnroe winning, 4-6, 7-6, 7-6, 6-4. Borg had long said that, “winning is the most beautiful thing for a tennis player. It doesn’t matter how much you win, you’re so happy, it’s a wonderful feeling. You just feel like you’re at the top of the mountain. It’s like a dream.” But when Borg lost to McEnroe on July 4 1981, it marked the last great day of his reign, though he would advance to the finals of the US Open that year, a major he failed to win in four championship match appearances.

Losing had never rested easily with Borg, but when he lost to McEnroe, he displayed a disturbing and uncharacteristic shrug. “When you lose you should get disappointed, because it’s not good to say to yourself, ‘I don’t really care, what’s the big deal, I lost in this final, but that’s what exactly what happened to me. I lost in the big final and didn’t really care that I lost, and that’s not me. After that I realized that what’s happening to me.” Borg’s magic had dissipated, the years of stress, sacrifice, and travel had taken its toll and he succumbed to burnout. He took three months off in attempts to rekindle his fire, but it had been doused. He played a string of exhibition matches and only one tournament in Monte Carlo throughout 1982. On January 23, 1983 while traveling in Bangkok, he announced his retirement at age 26. Borg flirted with comebacks in 1991, 1992, and 1993, but all to no avail.

When Borg retired from tennis in 1983 after a decade on the tour, he held the Open Era record for most major championships with 11. He is currently tied with Rod Laver and Novak Djokovic for singles major wins. Roy Emerson ended his career, which spanned the amateur and Open Eras, with 12 singles titles. The overall and Open Era marks have since been surpassed by Nadal and Sampras (14) and current holder Federer (17). He is in the sixth position all-time in major final appearances (16). His 141-16 (89.8 percent) match record is nearly two percent better than Nadal’s, a record Borg has held for nearly three decades. He won two major titles in the same season three times, tied for second best all-time with Sampras. His eight-year streak of winning at least one major title currently ranks second with Sampras and Federer. On clay, Borg won 93 percent of his matches (second best), 89 percent on grass (third best) and 85 percent on hard courts (sixth best).

Borg won 64 career tournament championships in singles (sixth best) in 88 final appearances and compiled a 609-127 record, which on percentage (83 percent) ranks second best in history. He was the ITF champion from 1978-80 and the ATP Player of the Year from 1976-80. Those distinctions cemented his place among the all-time greats, and didn’t need affirmation, but Borg received it when in his 1979 biography Jack Kramer had already listed the Swede among his 21 all-time great players. Although Borg, who rose to No. 1 in the world in August 1977, never won the US Open in ten attempts or Australian Open (only entered once in 1974), outsiders made more of those “failures” than Borg. “I didn’t lie awake at night wondering why I didn’t win at Flushing Meadows,” he said. “That just wasn’t going to happen.” The Björn Borg Story was published in 1975 and fellow Hall of Famer Eugene Scott wrote Borg’s autobiography, My Life and Game in 1980.

In a May 6, 1991 Sports Illustrated article, the ever-articulate Arthur Ashe put Borg’s career in perspective, saying, “I think Björn could have won the US Open. I think he could have won the Grand Slam. But by the time he left, the historical challenge didn’t mean anything. He was bigger than the game. He was like Elvis or Liz Taylor or somebody.” Grand Slam Best Results

Question: What nationality was tennis champion Bjorn Borg?
Answer: Swedish