Pen The Game: Salute the Legend : Roger Federer

Monday, February 26, 2007

Salute the Legend : Roger Federer

Today marks the 161st week of Federer's reign as no 1 player in the tennis world. Today he has broken the record of Jimmy Connors who was no.1 for 160 consecutive weeks.

Federer Says

It was never really one of my goals to achieve this specific record. I had reached my goal in 2004, when I took over the lead in the world ranking. I remember the moment as though being set free somehow; I then suddenly started playing a lot better and gaining more confidence. All these changes have allowed me to stay at the top for this long. So it is rather surprising to me to beat Jimmy Connors’ 30-year-old record today.

Cutting the cake when Federer became No.1 for the 1st time
img src http://www.atptennis.com/en/players/gallery/?Event=federer161

This record is really commendable as no other player in the past 3 years has ever come near to challenge Federer for the no.1 post, though there were some battles with Nadal but Federer is far ahead of Nadal in ATP points. Federer has 8120 Atp points to Nadal's 4705. One more year of reign is on cards :)

Stats from Federer's Site

The stats

Consecutive weeks at number one
1. Roger Federer (SUI): 161 (between February 2004 and February 2007)
2. Jimmy Connors (USA): 160 (between July 1974 and August 1977)
3. Ivan Lendl (TCH/USA): 157 (between September 1985 and September 1988)
4. Pete Sampras (USA): 102 (between April 1996 and March 1998)
5. Lleyton Hewitt (AUS): 75 (between November 2001 and April 2003)

Total weeks at number one
1. Pete Sampras (USA): 286
2. Ivan Lendl (TCH/USA): 270
3. Jimmy Connors (USA): 268
4. John McEnroe (USA): 170
5. Roger Federer (SUI): 161
6. Björn Borg (SUE): 109
7. Andre Agassi (USA): 101
8. Lleyton Hewitt (AUS): 80
9. Stefan Edberg (SUE): 72
10. Jim Courier (USA): 58

Years ended at number one
1. Pete Sampras (USA): 6 years in series (1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998)
2. Jimmy Connors (USA): 5 years in series (1974, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978)
3. John McEnroe (USA): 4 years in series (1981, 1982, 1983, 1984)
3. Ivan Lendl (TCH/USA): 4 years (1983, 1985, 1987, 1989)
5. Roger Federer (SUI): 3 years in series (2004, 2005, 2006)

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