Simply An Icon.

 

"Serena Williams leaves tennis as the greatest player ever - said Billie Jean King on the eve of the US Open. After a career that has inspired a new generation of players and fans, she will be remembered as a champion who has won on the field and improved the sport's overall profile."

Her hits, the records, could take up an entire book. Serena won 23 Grand Slams in singles, one less than the Australian Margaret Court's record, and 73 overall titles in her career. She is the second most titled player at the WTA Finals, in which she has triumphed five times as Steffi Graf, the most "agée" to have occupied the place of number 1 in the world (in May 2017 at 35 years and 224 days).

More than the records, her history speaks. A family epic, a story of redemption that began in a violent Los Angeles suburb of Compton, passed through grief over the death of sister Yetunde Price in a midnight shooting on September 14, 2003.

A story oriented toward success pursued not as an end but as a means.

Voice and face of the battle against discrimination and for women's freedom, she has taken on the role of champion and icon.

Being herself also included, for Serena, the story of the difficulties experienced after the birth of her daughter. "I wanted to talk about all my post-partum problems. I did it for all the mothers who have had so many similar stories, to give them a voice," she said at Roland Garros 2018.

A tournament to which she presented herself with an iconic look, a tight and black jumpsuit reminiscent of the cartoon character Catwoman. "I feel like a warrior princess; I have always wanted to be a superhero," she added. However, in addition to aesthetics, the suit also served to help blood circulation after a pulmonary embolism, the second she suffered, which kept her in bed a month and a half after giving birth. "For all the mothers who, like me, have had a hard recovery from pregnancy, here I am. If I can do it, you can do it too," she wrote on social media.

She is a role model for Naomi Osaka, Sloane Stephens, Madison Keys, and Coco Gauff, for all the African-American tennis players to whom she has shown a way. "I think tennis is a great sport for women, and it is great to be able to show your personality, be yourself and do something you love deeply," she said.

Photo by Ian Johnson/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images.

Racism has always been part of her history. Serena has always known and fought all this for herself, the other players, the public, and those who consider her a point of reference. "It is easier to break the Grand Slam record than to break the cycles of poverty, discrimination, and sexism," she said in 2018. 

Nevertheless, she has not stopped trying to pursue both goals.

She also did it as an entrepreneur, carefully choosing the start-ups to be financed through her fund, Serena Ventures, and parameters such as the inclusion policy. She will do this by writing children's books. The first one will be out in the next few months. She will do it while continuing to be Serena.

She played for herself and others. She succeeded in the sporting great's ultimate mission: to leave her world in better conditions than those she had found at the beginning of her career.

Simply an icon.

Another Ballerina Look for the Us Open 2018. 

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US Open Grand Slam 2022. Photo by Ansa.