87 Facts About Bjorn Borg

Bjorn Rune Borg is a Swedish former world No 1 tennis player.

Bjorn Borg was the first man since 1886 to contest six consecutive Wimbledon finals, a record surpassed by Roger Federer's seven consecutive finals.

Bjorn Borg is the only man to achieve the Channel Slam three times.

Bjorn Borg contested the French Open, Wimbledon and US Open finals in the same year three times.

Bjorn Borg won three major titles without dropping a set during those tournaments.

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Bjorn Borg won three year-end championships and 16 Grand Prix Super Series titles.

Bjorn Borg was ATP Player of the Year from 1976 to 1980, and was the year-end world No 1 in the ATP rankings in 1979 and 1980 and ITF World Champion from 1978 to 1980.

Bjorn Borg is the only Swede, male or female, to win over 10 majors.

Bjorn Borg unexpectedly retired from tennis in 1981, at the age of 25.

Bjorn Borg is widely considered one of the all-time greats of the sport.

Bjorn Borg was ranked by Tennis magazine as the sixth-greatest male player of the Open Era.

Bjorn Borg's father gave him the racket, beginning his tennis career.

Bjorn Borg's muscularity allowed him to put heavy topspin on both his forehand and two-handed backhand.

Bjorn Borg followed Jimmy Connors in using the two-handed backhand.

At the age of 15, Bjorn Borg represented Sweden in the 1972 Davis Cup and won his debut singles rubber in five sets against veteran Onny Parun of New Zealand.

Bjorn Borg joined the professional circuit in 1973, and reached his first singles final in April at the Monte Carlo Open, which he lost to Ilie Nastase.

Bjorn Borg was unseeded at his first French Open and reached the fourth round where he lost in four sets to eighth-seeded Adriano Panatta.

Bjorn Borg was seeded sixth at his first Wimbledon Championships, in large part due to a boycott by the ATP, and reached the quarterfinal, where he was defeated in a five-set match by Roger Taylor.

Bjorn Borg made his only appearance at the Australian Open at the age of 17, and reached the third round, where he lost in straight sets to eventual finalist Phil Dent.

Just before his 18th birthday in June 1974, Bjorn Borg won his first top-level singles title at the Italian Open, defeating defending champion and top-seeded Ilie Nastase in the final and becoming its youngest winner.

Barely 18, Bjorn Borg was the youngest-ever male French Open champion up to that point.

In early 1975, Bjorn Borg defeated Rod Laver, then 36 years old, in a semifinal of the World Championship Tennis finals in Dallas, Texas, in five sets.

Bjorn Borg retained his French Open title in 1975, beating Guillermo Vilas in the final in straight sets.

Bjorn Borg then reached the Wimbledon quarterfinals, where he lost to eventual champion Ashe.

Bjorn Borg did not lose another match at Wimbledon until 1981.

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However, Bjorn Borg never lost another Davis Cup singles rubber, and, by the end of his career, he had stretched that winning streak to 33.

In early 1976, Bjorn Borg won the World Championship Tennis year-end WCT Finals in Dallas, Texas, with a four-set victory over Guillermo Vilas in the final.

At the 1976 French Open, Bjorn Borg lost to the Italian Adriano Panatta, who remains the only player to defeat Bjorn Borg at this tournament.

Bjorn Borg won Wimbledon in 1976 without losing a set, defeating the favored Ilie Nastase in the final.

Bjorn Borg became the youngest male Wimbledon champion of the modern era at 20 years and 1 month.

Bjorn Borg was awarded the ATP Player of the Year award and ranked world No 1 by Tennis Magazine.

Bjorn Borg eventually played, and won, a single WCT event, the Monte Carlo WCT.

An out-of-court settlement was reached whereby Bjorn Borg committed to play six or eight WCT events in 1978 which were then part of the Grand Prix circuit.

Bjorn Borg skipped the French Open in 1977 because he was under contract with WTT, but he repeated his Wimbledon triumph, although this time he was pushed much harder.

Bjorn Borg defeated his good friend Vitas Gerulaitis in a semifinal in five sets.

Bjorn Borg was rated number one for 1977 by Tennis Magazine, Tennis Magazine, Barry Lorge, Lance Tingay, Rino Tommasi, Judith Elian and Rod Laver.

Bjorn Borg was at the height of his career from 1978 through 1980, completing the French Open-Wimbledon double all three years.

In 1978, Bjorn Borg won the French Open with a win over Vilas in the final.

Bjorn Borg did not drop a set during the tournament, a feat only he, Nastase, and Rafael Nadal have accomplished at the French Open during the open era.

Bjorn Borg defeated Connors in straight sets in the 1978 Wimbledon final.

Bjorn Borg was suffering from a bad blister on his thumb that required pre-match injections.

That autumn, Bjorn Borg faced John McEnroe for the first time in a semifinal of the Stockholm Open, and lost.

Bjorn Borg was named ATP Player of the Year and was the first ITF World Champion.

Bjorn Borg lost to McEnroe again in four sets in the final of the 1979 WCT Finals but was now overtaking Connors for the top ranking.

Bjorn Borg established himself firmly in the top spot with his fourth French Open singles title and fourth straight Wimbledon singles title, defeating Connors in a straight-set semifinal at the latter tournament.

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At the 1979 French Open, Bjorn Borg defeated big-serving Victor Pecci in a four-set final, and in the 1979 Wimbledon final Bjorn Borg came from behind to overcome an even bigger server, Roscoe Tanner.

Bjorn Borg was upset by Tanner at the US Open, in a four-set quarterfinal played under the lights.

Bjorn Borg then beat Gerulaitis in straight sets, winning his first Masters and first title in New York.

Bjorn Borg finished the year at No 1 in the ATP Point rankings and was considered the No 1 player in the world by most authorities.

Bjorn Borg then won his fifth consecutive Wimbledon singles title, defeating McEnroe in a five-set final, often cited as the best Wimbledon final ever played.

Bjorn Borg then won 19 straight points on serve in the deciding set and prevailed after 3 hours, 53 minutes.

Bjorn Borg himself commented years later that this was the first time that he was afraid that he would lose, as well as feeling that it was the beginning of the end of his dominance.

In September, 1980 Bjorn Borg reached the final of the US Open for the third time, losing to John McEnroe in five sets in a match that cemented what had become the greatest contemporary rivalry, albeit short-lived, in men's tennis.

Bjorn Borg defeated McEnroe in the final of the 1980 Stockholm Open, and faced him one more time that year, in the round-robin portion of the year-end Masters, actually played in January 1981.

Bjorn Borg then defeated Ivan Lendl for his second Masters title.

Bjorn Borg again finished the year at No 1 in the ATP Point Rankings and was considered the No 1 player in the world by most tennis authorities.

Bjorn Borg won his last Grand Slam title at the French Open in 1981, defeating Lendl in a five-set final.

Bjorn Borg's six French Open Grand Slam titles was a record bettered only by Rafael Nadal in 2012.

In reaching the Wimbledon final in 1981, Bjorn Borg stretched his winning streak at the All England Club to a record 41 matches.

However, Bjorn Borg's streak was brought to an end by McEnroe, who defeated him in four sets.

However, Bjorn Borg wanted to curtail his schedule after many years of winning so often.

Bjorn Borg failed to win the US Open in nine tries, losing four finals, 1976 and 1978 to Jimmy Connors, and 1980 and 1981 to John McEnroe.

The surface was hard court from 1978 onward and Bjorn Borg reached the final there on hard court on three occasions, in 1978,1980 and 1981.

In 1978,1979 and 1980, Bjorn Borg was halfway to a Grand Slam after victories at the French and Wimbledon only to falter at Flushing Meadows, the left-handed Roscoe Tanner being his conqueror in 1979.

In 1982, Bjorn Borg played only one tournament, losing to Yannick Noah in the quarterfinals of Monte Carlo in April.

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Nevertheless, Bjorn Borg's announcement in January 1983 that he was retiring from the game at the age of 26 was a shock to the tennis world.

Bjorn Borg did play Monte Carlo again in March 1983, reaching the second round, and Stuttgart in July 1984.

Bjorn Borg faced Jordi Arrese in his first match back, again at Monte Carlo but without practising or playing any exhibition matches and fell in two sets.

Bjorn Borg fared slightly better in 1993, taking a set off his opponent in each of the three matches he played.

Bjorn Borg later joined the Champions tour, returning to shorter hair and using modern rackets.

Bjorn Borg had one of the most distinctive playing styles in the Open Era.

Bjorn Borg hit the ball hard and high from the back of the court and brought it down with considerable topspin, which made his ground strokes very consistent.

Bjorn Borg was one of the first top players to use heavy topspin on his shots consistently.

One of the factors that made Bjorn Borg unique was his dominance on the grass courts of Wimbledon, where, since World War II, baseliners did not usually succeed.

Bjorn Borg fathered a son named Robin in 1985 with the Swedish model Jannike Bjorling; Robin had a daughter in 2014.

Bjorn Borg was married to the Italian singer Loredana Berte from 1989 to 1993.

Bjorn Borg narrowly avoided personal bankruptcy when business ventures failed.

Only Nadal, Federer, and Djokovic have managed to achieve this double since, and Andre Agassi, Nadal, Federer and Djokovic are the only male players since Bjorn Borg to have won the French Open and Wimbledon men's singles titles over their career.

Ilie Nastase once said about Bjorn Borg, "We're playing tennis, and he's playing something else".

Bjorn Borg is widely considered to be one of the greatest players in the history of the sport.

Bjorn Borg was the only player mentioned in four categories: defense, footwork, intangibles, and mental toughness—with his mental game and footwork singled out as the best in open-era history.

Bjorn Borg never won the US Open, losing in the final four times.

Bjorn Borg did not win the Australian Open, which he only played once in 1974 as a 17-year-old.

Phil Dent, a contemporary of Bjorn Borg, has pointed out that skipping Grand Slam tournaments—especially the Australian Open—was not unusual then, before counting Grand Slam titles became the norm.

From 22 to 24 September 2017, Bjorn Borg was the victorious captain of Team Europe in the first-ever edition of the Laver Cup, held in Prague, Czech Republic.

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Bjorn Borg returned as the coach of Team Europe for the second edition in Chicago, Illinois from 21 to 23 September 2018.

Bjorn Borg returned as captain of Team Europe, which had a resounding win over Team World, defeating McEnroe's players 14 to 1.