Dinara Safina
I follow religiously the latest news on tennis,be it men's or women's.
So this year Rafael Nadal finally won his first Wimbledon title (he won Olympics too) and Justine Henin retired from the game.
...but there's one player that her determination will inspire you, and I believe everyone can relate to it.
Dinara Safina was on the verge of quitting the sport after strings of really bad results in the first quarter of the season. She almost completely lost faith in the sport but her coach,Ċ½eljko Krajan convinced her that she had the talent to succeed and she has responded with a superb run of form that would have made other tennis players envy of her.
Winning the Berlin Open in May was a complete turnaround for Safina. She defeated Henin, which she previously NEVER took her off a set before, Serena Williams and Elena Dementieva in the final en-route to the title.
Since then, she has won 46 out of her last 51 matches, reached the French Open & Beijing Olympics finals (where she lost to Ana Ivanovic and Dementieva respectively), won another 3 titles in Los Angeles, Montreal and recently, Tokyo. These tournaments are big tournaments, mind you. So the 4 titles she won made her US$686,200 richer OKAY?
Let me quote what she said of her remarkable turnaround in a press conference in Stuttgart:
“At the beginning of the year it was really terrible, I could already give up and say, ‘Okay, I’ve had enough of this. I’ll go and study or something’.
“Really, at the beginning of this year I was so deep in the hole I didn’t know how to get out of there. I was completely lost. I was not enjoying. It wasn’t that I stopped loving this game, but it was why do I have to suffer so much? I go on the court and nothing is going o, and it was really a disaster.”
“He had to because I was not really a very positive or confident person, and he had to repeat a million times a day that I can play tennis, that I can hit the ball, I can be good,” she said.
“He was patient enough to repeat this, and finally I began to believe more in myself.
“I stayed patient and thought maybe I have to work harder and give myself time to get better. After this it started to pay off with my results.
“I think in the crucial moments I was suffering so much, so now, in the tough moments, I’m more positive and I’m like okay, I’ve been in worse moments so I’ll get out of here. It’s made me stronger.”So folks, Miss Dinara Safina is teaching us a very meaningful lesson here. She would have retired by now if it wasn't for her coach, and most of all, her determination and willingness to work on her failures and to succeed.
Now I can proudly say that you know, I may have been failing a lot of times in life but I am determined to work harder and with positive & never-say-die attitudes, I can get up, with bruises and all, finding my way back on track and to succeed in life.
We often take these things for granted and you can still read stories about people committing suicide because they 'presumably' failed in their lives.
That's not the best solution. Why take your own life?
I hope Dinara Safina will inspire you guys, because she has inspired me.
Some quick facts about Safina:
1)As of October 3rd, she currently ranks third in the world.
2)She's Marat Safin's sister.
3)Date of Birth: April 27, 1986. Height: 1.82 m. Weight: 70kg.
3)...and as of October 3rd, she has pocketed $2,342,820. More to come! Heh.
Kudos, Safina. Keep up the good work!
Infos courtesy of http://www.sonyericssonwtatour.com/
