Pam Shriver

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Olympic medal record
Women's tennis
Gold 1988 Seoul Doubles

Pamela Howard Shriver Lazenby (born July 4, 1962, in Baltimore, Maryland), is a former professional tennis player and current sports broadcaster from the United States. During the 1980s and 1990s, she won 133 top-level titles, including 22 women's doubles titles and 1 mixed doubles title at Grand Slam tournaments. She also won a women's doubles gold medal at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, partnering with Zina Garrison. She is generally considered to be one of the greatest female players never to have won a Grand Slam singles title.

Shriver first came to prominence as a 16 year-old amateur in 1978, when she reached the women's singles final at the U.S. Open. She defeated the reigning Wimbledon champion Martina Navratilova in a semifinal 7-6, 7-6. Shriver then lost to Chris Evert in the final 7-5, 6-4. Shriver also won the first of her 21 career singles titles in 1978 at Columbus, Ohio.

The 1978 U.S. Open final was the only Grand Slam singles final of Shriver's career. She lost the next eight Grand Slam singles semifinals she played, four of them to Navratilova, two to Evert, two to Steffi Graf, and one to Hana Mandlikova.

Shriver's most notable successes after 1978 came in doubles play, winning 111 women's doubles titles and 1 mixed doubles title during her career. She is one of only five female players in the open era to have won more than 100 career titles.

Shriver and Navratilova formed one of the all time great women's doubles teams, capturing seven Australian Open, five French Open, five Wimbledon, and four U.S. Open titles. In 1984, the pair captured all four Grand Slam women's doubles titles. This was part of a record 109-match winning streak between 1983 and 1985. The pair were named the WTA Tour's "Doubles Team of the Year" eight consecutive times from 1981 through 1988 and won the WTA Tour Championships title ten times between 1981 and 1992.

Shriver won another women's doubles Grand Slam title at the U.S. Open in 1991, partnering with Natasha Zvereva. She was also the 1987 French Open mixed doubles champion with Emilio Sanchez. She swept all three gold medals (singles, women's doubles, and mixed doubles) at the 1991 Pan American Games in Havana, Cuba.

Shriver reached the World No. 1 doubles ranking in 1985. Throughout the 1980s, she was ranked among the World's Top 10 in women's singles, peaking at World No. 3.

Shriver retired from competitive play in 1996 but has since maintained a presence on the professional tour, mentoring Venus Williams for a while and providing television commentary for ABC, CBS, and ESPN in the United States, the BBC in the United Kingdom, and 7 Sport in Australia.

Shriver was elected to serve as president of the WTA Tour Players Association from 1991-94. She also has served as president of the USA Tennis Foundation, and on the board of directors of the United States Tennis Association.

Shriver was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame in 2002.

Shriver's first husband, Joe Shapiro, a former Walt Disney company lawyer, died of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 1999.

In 2002, Shriver married the former James Bond actor George Lazenby. She gave birth to their first child, George Jr., in July 2004. On October 1, 2005, Shriver gave birth to twins, Kate and Sam. She is also a step-mother to George's daughter, Melanie Lazenby, from his previous marriage. The family lives in Brentwood, California.

Shriver is a graduate of McDonogh School in Owings Mills, Maryland. She is also a minority owner of the Baltimore Orioles and is extremely active in various charitable organizations.

Contents

[edit] Grand Slam singles final

[edit] Runner-up (1)

Year Championship Opponent in Final Score in Final
1978 U.S. Open Flag of United States Chris Evert 7-5, 6-4

[edit] Grand Slam singles performance timeline

Tournament 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 Career SR
Australian Open A A QF SF SF SF QF 3R NH QF 4R 3R 3R 3R 3R 1R 2R 1R 1R 0 / 16
French Open A A A A A 3R A A A A A A A A A A 1R A A 0 / 2
Wimbledon 3R 2R 4R SF 4R 2R QF QF 1R SF SF 3R A 3R 2R A 3R 1R 2R 0 / 17
U.S. Open F 1R QF 4R SF SF QF QF QF QF 2R 1R A 3R 2R 1R 2R 2R 1R 0 / 18
SR 0 / 2 0 / 2 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 4 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 2 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 1 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 2 0 / 4 0 / 3 0 / 3 0 / 53

NH = tournament not held.

A = did not participate in the tournament.

SR = the ratio of the number of Grand Slam singles tournaments won to the number of those tournaments played.

[edit] External links

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