ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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Roger Federer (born August 1, 1979) is a Swiss tennis player. He began his professional career in 1998 and was world number 1 for 237 consecutive weeks (a record) from to and a total of 310 weeks as number 1.

1981-1997
Unlike many champions before him, Roger Federer did not immediately know the successes and won few tournaments at the start.

Roger Federer began playing tennis at the age of three and joined TC Old Boys tennis club in his hometown of Basel five years later. He was trained by the Swiss Seppli Kacovsky from 1989 to 1994 and by the Australian Peter Carter, who gave him private lessons until 1995. For five years, his efforts will enable him to become a national champion in all junior categories. Thus Federer, at the age of twelve, decided to continue his training as a tennis player. In 1995, he joined the Swiss National Centre of Scublens where he won no fewer than seven junior tournaments from 1995 to 1997. During this period, Federer will also learn to speak French, which will allow him to make his first interviews with Francophones. When at , a student of the Swiss National Tennis Centre, he is asked what his goals are as a sportsman, Basel is not lacking in ambition. If his comrades admit "to go professional or integrate the top 100 players in the world," he already clearly wants to become "world number one".

Starting in 1997, Federer began competing in international tournaments and won his first major junior tournament in Prato in May.

At the same time (Federer was then aged ), he decided to leave school and focus his future solely on a career as a tennis player. A risky bet because although he started to forge a name on the junior circuit, he cannot live alone from his sporting results.

1998

Roger Federer's first professional game dates back to July 1998 at the Gstaad tournament, which he won with a wild card. He bows to the first round against the world 6-4, 6-4. The only two games he won on the senior circuit during the year were in L'Open de Toulouse, where he reached the quarterfinals but fell against the future winner of the tournament, Jan Siemerink, who was then world-wide. He also lost to Andre Agassi 6-3, 6-2 in the first round of the Basel tournament. That same year, on the junior circuit, he finished number one in the world and won both the Wimbledon tournament (in singles, without losing a set, and in doubles with Olivier Rochus) and the Orange Bowl, the official junior world championship, where he won in the final against Guillermo Coria. He also reached the US Open Junior final, but had to bow 3-6, 5-7 against David Nalbandian, as well as the semifinal of the Australian Junior Open, eliminated in three sets by Swedish Andreas Vinciguerra 6-4,