Martina Navratilova (Czech: Martina Navrátilová; born October 18, 1956, in Prague, Czechoslovakia) is a former World No. 1 women's tennis player. Billie Jean King said about Navratilova in 2006, "She's the greatest singles, doubles and mixed doubles player who's ever lived."^] Tennis writer Steve Flink, in his book The Greatest Tennis Matches of the Twentieth Century, named her as the second best female player of the 20th century, directly behind Steffi Graf.  Tennis magazine has selected her as the greatest female tennis player for the years 1965 through 2005.

Navratilova won 18 Grand Slam singles titles, 31 Grand Slam women's doubles titles (an all-time record), and 10 Grand Slam mixed doubles titles. She reached the Wimbledon singles final 12 times, including 9 consecutive years from 1982 through 1990, and won the women's singles title at Wimbledon a record 9 times. She and King each won 20 Wimbledon titles, an all-time record. Navratilova is one of just three women to have accomplished a career Grand Slam in singles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles (called the Grand Slam "boxed set").
 
She holds the open era record for most singles titles (167) and doubles titles (177). She also recorded the longest winning streak in tennis history (74 consecutive matches) and three of the six longest winning streaks in women's tennis history. Navratilova, Margaret Court, and Maureen Connolly Brinker share the record for the most consecutive Grand Slam singles titles (six). Navratilova reached 11 consecutive Grand Slam singles finals, second all-time to Steffi Graf's 13. In women's doubles, Navratilova and Pam Shriver won 109 consecutive matches and won all four Grand Slam titles in 1984. They also tied Louise Brough Clapp's and Margaret Osborne duPont's record of 20 Grand Slam women's doubles titles as a team.

Originally from the former Czechoslovakia, she lost her citizenship when she defected to the United States in 1975 at the age of 18 and became a U.S. citizen in 1981. On January 9, 2008, she had her Czech citizenship restored.  She has stated that she has not renounced her American citizenship nor does she plan to do so and that the restoration of her Czech citizenship was not politically motivated.

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Navratilova was born Martina Šubertová in 1956. Her parents divorced when she was three, and in 1962 her mother Jana married Miroslav Navrátil, who became her first tennis coach. Martina then took the name of her stepfather (adding the feminine suffix "ová"), thus becoming Martina Navrátilová (pronounced [ˈmarcɪna ˈnavraːcɪlovaː]

In 1972 at the age of 15, Navratilova won the Czechoslovakia national tennis championship. In 1973, aged 16, she made her debut on the USLTA professional tour but did not turn professional until 1975. She won her first professional singles title in Orlando, Florida in 1974 at the age of 17. Navratilova first lived with former Vaudeville actress, Frances Dewey Wormser, and her husband, Morton Wormser, a major tennis enthusiast, when she first moved to the United States.

A left-handed serve-and-volleyer with superb volleying skills, Navratilova raised the women’s game to new levels with her power and aggression.  She struggled with her weight in the early years of her career and was at one point unflatteringly labelled the "Great Wide Hope" by journalist Bud Collins. Her determination, however, to reach the top of the game saw her embark on a punishing routine to get herself into shape, assisted by basketball player Nancy Lieberman. Eventually, extreme levels of fitness and conditioning were hallmarks of her game.

Navratilova was a finalist at two Grand Slam singles tournaments in 1975. She lost in the final of the Australian Open to Evonne Goolagong Cawley and in the final of the French Open to Chris Evert. After losing to Evert in the semifinals of that year's US Open, the 18-year-old Navratilova went to the offices of the Immigration and Naturalization Service in New York City and informed them that she wished to defect from Communist Czechoslovakia. Within a month, she received a green card.
 
Chris Evert was Navratilova's first threat.  She soundly beat Evert and came out on top of the tennis seeds.
 
A new threat to the 30-year old Navratilova's dominance, in the form of 17-year old German player Steffi Graf, emerged on the scene in 1987 when she beat Navratilova in the final of the French Open, whipping forehands and sliced backhand passing shots out of Navratilova’s reach. Navratilova beat Graf in the 1987 Wimbledon and US Open finals (and at the US Open became only the third player in the open era to win the women’s singles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles at the same event).

But Graf's consistent play throughout 1987 allowed her to obtain the World No. 1 before the end of the year. (Graf eventually broke Navratilova's records of 156 consecutive weeks and 331 total weeks as the World No. 1 singles player but did not break Navratilova's record 167 singles titles as Graf reached 107.) In 1988, Graf won all four Grand Slam singles titles, beating Navratilova 5–7, 6–2, 6–1 in the Wimbledon final along the way. In 1989, Graf and Navratilova met in the finals of both Wimbledon and the US Open, with Graf winning both encounters in three sets. Despite the significant age difference between the two players, Navratilova won 9 of the 18 career singles matches with Graf and 5 of the 9 Grand Slam singles matches with her.

Personal life

In her autobiography, Being Myself, Navratilova says that she had had romantic crushes on teachers of both sexes and, later, felt strongly attracted to other female tennis players.

In 1981, shortly after being granted U.S. citizenship, Navratilova came out publicly about her sexual orientation. From 1984 to 1991, Navratilova had a long-term relationship with partner Judy Nelson. Their split in 1991 included a much-publicized legal wrangle. Navratilova was featured in a WITA (Women's International Tennis Association) calendar, shot by Jean Renard with her Wimbledon trophies and Nelson's children in the background.

Navratilova also made a humorous guest appearance in a 2000 episode on the gay-themed NBC sitcom Will & Grace in which a flashback 'revealed' that she had been a heterosexual until a 1985 relationship with Karen Walker turned her gay. Her other guest television appearances have included a brief role as a nurse on the soap opera All My Children in 1979 and an appearance as herself on the mystery series Hart to Hart in 1983. More recently, in 2006, she played herself on an unaired episode of the now-canceled sitcom Jake in Progress.

In 1985, Navratilova released an autobiography, co-written with New York Times sports columnist George Vecsey, entitled Martina in the U.S. and Being Myself in the rest of the world. She had earlier co-authored a tennis instruction book with Mary Carillo in 1982 entitled Tennis My Way. She later wrote three mystery novels with Liz Nickles: The Total Zone (1994),^[12] Breaking Point (1996), and Killer Instinct (1997). Navratilova's most recent literary effort was a health and fitness book entitled Shape Your Self, which came out in 2006.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9TknPxPdEE   - Martina Navratilova - Grand Slam art

Activism and politics

Navratilova and Mark Tewksbury read the Declaration of Montreal at the opening ceremonies of the World Outgames.

When not playing tennis, Navratilova is involved with various charities that benefit animal rights, underprivileged children, and gay rights. She filed a lawsuit against Amendment 2, a 1992 ballot proposition in Colorado designed to deny gays and lesbians legal protection from discrimination. In the same year, she spoke before the National March on Washington for Gay and Lesbian Rights.

In 2000, she was the recipient of National Equality Award from the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay and lesbian activist/lobbying group.

A pescetarian, Navratilova has appeared in ad campaigns for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. In an April 2006 interview, she said she had recently begun eating fish again because she found it hard to get enough protein while on the road.

She has also spoken out on a number of volatile political issues, including tort/litigation reform, but perhaps her most consistent theme — aside from gay and lesbian rights — has been her unstinting opposition to Communism, and unrepentant opposition to the former Eastern Bloc power structure that she believes compelled her to flee her native Czechoslovakia.

For example, on a recent segment of the Leonard Lopate Show in which she was promoting her new fitness training book-she denounced the Soviet Union's control over Czechoslovakia, maintaining that she refuses to speak Russian to this day because of the Soviet Union's former hegemony over Eastern Europe. When questioned by the host about her fellow Czechs' reaction to her defection she averred that they welcomed it, and that their hostility was directed towards the Communist regime in power, not her.

"Whenever I hear some say, 'Oh, Communism isn't bad,' I say, 'Why don't you live in a Communist country if you think it's so great?'"

Navratilova was a guest on CNN's Connie Chung Tonight show on July 17, 2002. During the show, Chung quoted a German newspaper which quoted Navratilova as saying:

"The most absurd part of my escape from the unjust system is that I have exchanged one system that suppresses free opinion for another. The Republicans in the U.S. manipulate public opinion and sweep controversial issues under the table. It's depressing. Decisions in America are based solely on the question of how much money will come out of it and not on the questions of how much health, morals or environment suffer as a result."

Navratilova said that the remarks referred to what she perceived as a trend of centralization of government power and a loss of personal freedom. In the discussion that followed, Chung questioned, "Can I be honest with you? I can tell you that when I read this, I have to tell you that I thought it was un-American, unpatriotic. I wanted to say, go back to Czechoslovakia. You know, if you don't like it here, this a country that gave you so much, gave you the freedom to do what you want." Navratilova responded, "And I'm giving it back. This is why I speak out. When I see something that I don't like, I'm going to speak out because you can do that here. And again, I feel there are too many things happening that are taking our rights away." She went on to say that athletes have a responsibility to speak out when things aren't right.

Grand Slam singles tournaments

Wins (18)

Year	Championship	Opponent in Final	Score in Final
1978	Wimbledon	Chris Evert	2–6, 6–4, 7–5
1979	Wimbledon (2)	Chris Evert	6–4, 6–4
1981	Australian Open	Chris Evert	6–7(4), 6–4, 7–5
1982	French Open	Andrea Jaeger	7–6(6), 6–1
1982	Wimbledon (3)	Chris Evert	6–1, 3–6, 6–2
1983	Wimbledon (4)	Andrea Jaeger	6–0, 6–3
1983	US Open	Chris Evert	6–1, 6–3
1983	Australian Open (2)	Kathy Jordan	6–2, 7–6(5)
1984	French Open (2)	Chris Evert	6–3, 6–1
1984	Wimbledon (5)	Chris Evert	7–6(5), 6–2
1984	US Open (2)	Chris Evert	4–6, 6–4, 6–4
1985	Wimbledon (6)	Chris Evert	4–6, 6–3, 6–2
1985	Australian Open (3)	Chris Evert	6–2, 4–6, 6–2
1986	Wimbledon (7)	Hana Mandlíková	7–6(1), 6–3
1986	US Open (3)	Helena Suková	6–3, 6–2
1987	Wimbledon (8)	Steffi Graf	7–5, 6–3
1987	US Open (4)	Steffi Graf	7–6(4), 6–1
1990	Wimbledon (9)	Zina Garrison	6–4, 6–1