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Jennifer Capriati
Former Olympic tennis champion Jennifer Capriati said she agonised for days before finally pulling out of the Athens Games with a hamstring injury.
Born: March 29, 1976
Country: USA
Event: Tennis
Former Olympic tennis champion Jennifer Capriati said she agonised for days before finally pulling out of the Athens Games with a hamstring injury.
The 28-year-old, a gold medallist at Barcelona in 1992, is replaced in the US team by Lisa Raymond.
Her's is typical story of a teen sensation loosing her nerves after early successes, going down the hill but bouncing right back to reclaim her rightful place in the world of women's tennis. The name is Jennifer Capriati.
At age 14 she reached the semifinals of the 1990 French Open. She followed it up by being the youngest-ever women's semifinalist at Wimbledon the following year. In 1992 she caused a sensation by winning the Olympic gold medal beating Steffi Graf in the final at Barcelona, Spain.
The pressures of being a celeb started to affect her as her career fell apart. She was stopped for shoplifting in a Florida mall in 1993, and the next year arrested for possession of marijuana after a party in a Florida motel.
But she made a superb comeback in the late 1990s. In 2001 she unexpectedly won her first Grand Slam singles title at the Australian Open and followed it up with a second Grand Slam victory at the 2001 French Open. In January 2002 she again won the Australian Open, defeating Martina Hingis to defend her title.
