Posted on 12/26/2004 2:23:23 PM PST by beyond the sea
HERMOSA BEACH, Calif. - Maria Sharapova loves to shop, gossip with girlfriends, write and pore over photos in glossy fashion magazines. But that's where similarities with other 17-year-olds end.
She emerged this year as one of the world's best tennis players, winning Wimbledon and carefully cultivating a lucrative endorsement portfolio whose worth puts a typical teenager's allowance to shame.
"One day I can be with my friend talking about the girliest, weird things and the next day I'm in a meeting talking about a deal or sponsorship or doing a photo shoot that are run by all adults that want my opinion," she told the Associated Press recently.
"I make the transition quite well. I always thought I'm more mature than other kids my age, but that's because of the sport I play and the business I'm in. If you're not mature, I don't know how you can accomplish what you do." ....................................
Sharapova, an only child, is extremely close to her parents. Even though she turns 18 in April, she's in no hurry to be on her own.
"I love my parents," she said. "I trust them so much that I don't feel I need to get rid of them."
(Excerpt) Read more at buffalonews.com ...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1302562/posts
HEY you know the rule, where's the pictures, now please!
Pictures!
LOL!
I don't know how to post pictures, but there are at least 10 good ones at the url I included in the first post -- (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1302562/posts). Please feel free, we all would feel better! She is so fine, and if you tookthe time to read the whole article, her head is just as fine as her appearance!
Pictures -- no Helen Thomases, no Eleanor Clifts, no liberal skanks of any size or shape!
;-)
Maria Sharapova year end progress ping..........
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1302562/posts
post # 13 .............. is my personal favorite.
Now that's a well-grounded young lady.
Best of luck to Maria!
You're lucky I'm on a handheld and can't post pics ;-)
Yeh, real lucky. ;-)
It's the rest of the FReepers who need to see this beautiful girl who loves her mother and father in the most correct way. I hope nothing changes her too much.... and I wish I were about 37 years younger.........oh, and four inches taller, and ......
;-)
I think she will win two, if not three, of the grand slam titles this year. My prediction: Wimbledon and the U.S. Open (MAYBE the Australian Open).
I hope so, but remember she's still so young and really did rise this past year much quicker than was expected. She's got it all. I've been studying tennis for about 40 years, and she's for real, and I love what is in her head. I hope she never changes.
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I don't know if you ever saw this -- from http://www.timesonline.co.uk -- July 05, 2004 -- I've just met a girl named Maria -- By Simon Worrall
Off the court she was like any other ten-year-old. She liked the Spice Girls; had a hamster called Mel; grumbled about long car trips and training too hard. She was a delightful child: bright, funny, with an effervescent personality and a bubbly sense of humour. Even then she brimmed with self-confidence. When I asked her whose game she admired most, she said with a grin: “Mine.”
On the court she reminded me of the margay, a small wild cat, like a miniature leopard, that lives in the jungles of Central America. Her emerald-green eyes had the look of a creature who you knew would never quite belong to anyone but herself. She was still only “peanut-sized”, as her father, Yuri, called her, with long, skinny legs and arms, corn-blonde hair, braces on her teeth and a dusting of freckles on her nose. But when she went to strike the ball, her little cat-face would bunch into a snarl, her body would coil itself like a spring behind her racket, she would hurl herself at the ball and, with an ear-splitting banshee scream that sent shivers down your spine, unleash a laser-guided ground stroke.
No girl in the history of tennis had hit a tennis ball as hard as Maria Sharapova. As Bollettieri, who has masterminded the careers of plenty of hard-hitters, including Monica Seles and Mary Pierce, eloquently put it: “She beats the f****** crap out of the ball.” But it wasn’t the sheer force of her ground strokes — the same strokes that rocked Serena Williams, the Mike Tyson of women’s tennis, back on her heels on Saturday — that already set Masha apart from the other child wonders clawing their way towards wealth and fame at Bollettieri’s academy. It was that she had a tennis brain.
“Maria possesses all the ingredients to become a superstar,” Mike DePalmer, one of the head coaches at the academy, told me. “She knows the tennis court. She possesses an innate skill. She has a terrific work ethic. She is very coachable. She is like a sponge.”
Like all the greats, she has a radar-like ability to anticipate exactly where her opponent’s ball will land the moment it leaves the strings of their racket — and to be there when it does. The player to whom she was being compared most was Chris Evert. When Evert first saw Masha hit she said: “I’m glad I am not playing now.”
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Sigh....
I hope she keeps a good head on her shoulders with her growing popularity. Being young and so good at what she does, I hope she doesn't get lost in all the hype and turn into a has-been within a few years when her tennis potential is right there for the taking. Tennis should come first and endorsements and photo shoots (most likely to follow), should come second.
Yeah really 'silliness'
bump - for research purposes only
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