49 Facts About Nicol David

Nicol David was the world number one for a record-breaking 108 consecutive months, ceding the ranking in September 2015 to Raneem El Weleily.

Nicol David has won the World Open title a record 8 times in 2005,2006,2008,2009,2010,2011,2012 and 2014, as well as the British Open title in 2005,2006,2008,2012 and 2014.

Nicol David remained the only female squash player to have achieved this until Raneem El Weleily won her second World Junior Championship in 2007.

Nicol David joined WISPA and turned professional in 2000 when she won her first WISPA title, after only a month on the tour.

On 7 June 2008, Nicol David was honoured with the Order of Merit in conjunction with the birthday of the His Majesty Tuanku Mizan Zainal Abidin.

Nicol David was the first recipient of the award which was established on 26 June 1975.

Nicol David was invited to carry the Olympic torch for Malaysia during the build up to the Athens Olympics in 2004 and appointed as UNDP National Goodwill Ambassador for Malaysia.

Nicol David held a 13-month, 51-match winning streak, from March 2006 until April 2007, when she finally lost to Natalie Grinham in the final of the 2007 Seoul Open.

Nicol David has two sisters, Lianne and Cheryl, both of whom are accomplished squash players at the national level.

Nicol David scored seven As in her Penilaian Menengah Rendah and seven As in her Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia ; the equivalent to GCSE, which she studied at Convent Green Lane Secondary School in Green Lane, Penang.

Nicol David played squash when she was five years old, and received coaching at the age of eight.

In 1994, Nicol David was chosen to join the Penang state squash team for the Malaysian Games tournament where she helped Penang win a gold medal in the team event, despite being ill at the time.

Nicol David won the Women's World Junior Squash Championships of 1999 beating her compatriot Lynn Leong in the final in Antwerp, Belgium, making her the youngest woman to become the world junior champion at the age of 15.

Nicol David successfully defended the title in Penang in 2001, becoming one of only two players in the history of squash to have won it twice; her coach was Richard Glanfield.

In 1999, Nicol David began to win major junior tournaments, including the British Junior Open, the German Junior Open, the SEA Games, and the Asian Junior Champion for both individual and team events.

Nicol David reached the quarterfinals of the previous World Junior Championships in August 1997 in Brazil, as a thirteen-year-old and had since claimed both the Asian junior and senior titles, as well as the gold medal in the Asian Games in December 1998.

Nicol David is one of a few squash player to have won all the age categories in the British Junior Open.

Nicol David joined WISPA and turned professional in 2000 when she won her first WISPA title, after only a month in the tour.

Nicol David won a sponsorship on the WISPA tour by Dunlop squash.

In 2001, Nicol David, who has played under Dunlop Sport sponsorship for most of her junior career and WISPA career, signed a two-year deal to play with Head rackets with local conglomerate Mulpha Sports.

Nicol David remained the only female squash player to have achieved this until 2007, when Raneem El Weleily won her second World Junior Championship.

Nicol David was the losing finalist twice in 2003, losing to the more experienced Cassie Jackman on her home ground and then to Linda Elriani in the Monte Carlo Classic in November.

Nicol David did not perform well in the other major WISPA events; she was eliminated in the first round of the Carol Weymuller US Open, in the British Open and in the Texas Open.

Nicol David's achievements included getting into the final of both the Kuala Lumpur Open and the Malaysian Open.

Nicol David started to progress in the very last month of the year by reaching the final of the Shanghai WISPA WorldStars Championship and the semi-finals of the World Open, to rise two places to number four in the January 2005 WISPA rankings.

Nicol David became the World's number 1 female squash player in January 2006 at the age of 23 to become the first Malaysian and the first Asian woman to be ranked World number 1 in the sport.

Nicol David became the twelfth holder of the position since the rankings were first produced in April 1983.

Nicol David started to show progress later in the year and recovered from the setback to win six straight tour titles and reclaimed the World number 1 spot.

Nicol David successfully defended her World Open title on 25 November 2006, at the Ulster Hall in Belfast by defeating Natalie Grinham in the final that was said to be "one of the great finals of the Women's World Open".

Nicol David became the first Malaysian athlete to win a world championship title for the second consecutive time, and the fourth person in history to retain the World Open Squash Championship.

Nicol David captured the Qatar Airways Challenge Open, the Dunlop British Open Championship, the Hong Kong Open, the Penang Open and the CIMB Malaysian Open.

Nicol David captured another six titles in the early months of 2007, then lost the final of the British Open to Australian Rachael Grinham in a five set final lasting 87 minutes.

In 2008, Nicol David won ten tour titles and was unbeaten.

Nicol David completed her most successful year to date, retaining her Cathay Pacific Hong Kong Open title for the third successive year in November to bring her 2008 WISPA World Tour title total to ten, extending her unbeaten Tour record since October 2007 to 53 matches.

Away from the tour, Nicol David secured her sixth successive biennial Asian Championship crown in February, after winning the first in July 1998 when aged just 14, and then lead Malaysia to the bronze medal in the Women's World Team Championship in Cairo.

Nicol David headed an unchanged top four, with Natalie Grinham at No 2; her older sister Rachael Grinham at No 3; and Natalie Grainger, of the United States, at No 4.

Twenty-one days after winning the Texas Open title, Nicol David captured her second Seoul City Open crown by defeating Jenny Duncalf in four sets.

Nicol David thus became the first player to win five Malaysian Open titles in a row since its inception in 1975.

Nicol David ended the year on a low when she lost in the semis to Jenny Duncalf in both the Qatar Classic and the US Open, the former ending in five sets.

Nicol David started 2010 ranked number 1 for the 42nd consecutive month.

Nicol David competed in her first tournament in March, the US$53,000 Chennai Open; she won all her matches in straight sets and was crowned as the champion, avenging two straight defeats to Jenny Duncalf in late 2009.

Thirteen days later, in the Kuala Lumpur Open, Nicol David defeated the fourth seeded Egyptian Omneya Abdel Kawy who upset second seed Jenny Duncalf in the semi-finals in straight sets to win her second successive WISPA title of the year.

Nicol David did not drop a game in the entire tournament, just as she did in the 2010 World Open in Egypt.

Nicol David was the first recipient of the award which was established on 26 June 1975.

Nicol David was one of the 28 people who received the Darjah Setia Pangkuan Negeri award, which carries the title Datuk, making her the youngest person ever to be conferred Datukship in Penang.

The former Prime Minister of Malaysia Tun Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, a fellow Penangite, once quipped that Nicol David is "now more famous than me".

In July 2007, Nicol David received Master of Arts honoris causa; an honorary degree by the University of Nottingham.

Nicol David has obtained the WISPA Player of the Year on six consecutive occasions, from 2005 until 2010.

Nicol David was given the honour of carrying the Olympic torch for Malaysia during the build up to the Athens Olympics of 2004, and was appointed UNDP National Goodwill Ambassador for Malaysia.