Good morning Pragmatic Obots!
It was an historic moment. In the 1990 Wimbledon women’s singles final, Martina Navratilova won her ninth singles title when she defeated Zina Garrison, the first Black woman to play on Wimbledon’s center court since 1958, when Althea Gibson won her second of two Wimbledon crowns. Being first has been a common occurrence for Ms. Garrison.
In 1981, at seventeen, she was the first Black player to win the junior singles championship at Wimbledon, and she also won the junior singles title at the U.S. Open. For these wins, the U.S. Olympic Committee named her the top female amateur athlete in tennis.
In her fifteen years as a professional tennis player, Ms. Garrison had an outstanding career. In 1987 she won the Australian Open mixed doubles with Sherwood Stewart, and in 1988 the pair won the mixed doubles crown at Wimbledon. (In 1990, she won the mixed doubles with Rich Leach.) Also, in 1988, Ms. Garrison was a member of the first U.S. Olympic buy 1 tablet viagra tennis team since 1924 to compete in the Olympic games. At he games, held in Seoul, Korea, she won the gold medal with Pam Shriver in doubles and a bronze medal in singles.
Another historic moment for Ms. Garrison occurred at the U.S. open in 1989 when she defeated Chris Evert 7-6, 6-2, during the last tournament of Ms. Evert’s career. Ms. Garrison also had big wins over Martina Navratilova and Steffi Graf, both champion players.
Ranked among the top ten women tennis players from 1984 to 1995, she was number two in 1989 and never lower than number six. She retired in 1997.
In 1988, Zina founded the Zina Garrison Foundation for the Homeless. A longtime activist for inner-city youth, she achieved a lifelong dream in 1991 with the opening of the Zina Garrison All-Court tennis Academy, which supports inner-city youth in Houston, Texas and was one of the leading youth programs of its kind. Ms. Garrison was also a member of the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.