Roger Federer wins record Wimbledon

Roger Federer finally got his record, winning 15 Grand Slams and beating the previous best of 14 by Pete Sampras, at the 2009 Wimbledon tournament. Pete Sampras flew all the way from the US to attend the men's final, and after the match ended, predicted that Federer could go on to win 18 or 19 Grand Slams in his career. But he had words of praise for Roger's American opponent Andy Roddick (photo Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images), who played the best tennis of his career, even better than his Swiss opponent on that day. Federer had many unforced errors and was not able to break Roddick's serve until the very last game in the final set, which gave him victory.



Roger Federer beat Andy Roddick 5-7 7-6 7-6 3-6 16-14 in a tense game, with many on the line hits, and close calls. The two sets that Federer won were by tie-breaks, while Roddick's wins came when he broke his Swiss opponent's serve. What really set the champion apart from the challenger were the incredible 50 aces he served in this game! Since there are no tie-breaks in the final set at Wimbledon it became the longest last set in history; Roddick had two occasions in that set to break Federer's serve but the champ held on. Roger served 22 of his aces in that last set and finally his endurance saw him through, breaking Andy's serve in the final game, and winning the record set 16-14. "I thought Andy played great," said Federer. "It was so different to what I have experienced in the last few years against Rafa. Today it was a serve-and-return game which is more classical for grass."

In the women's final the Williams sisters faced off, having beaten tennis babes Elena Demienteva and Dinara Safina in the semi-finals. In the finals Serena beat her older sister Venus 7-6 (7-3) 6-2 to take her third Wimbledon title and her 11th Grand Slam. "For the second time in my career, I have a number I want to reach," Serena Williams said in an interview at Wimbledon. "My first number was reaching Monica Seles, and I was finally able to do that. Now, I'm looking at Billie Jean King."

The Williams sisters also won their fourth women's doubles title at Wimbledon by beating Rennae Stubbs and Samantha Stosur of Australia 7-6 (4), 6-4.

The men's doubles title was won by Daniel Nestor of Canada and Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia, who beat top-seeded American twins Bob and Mike Bryan 7-6 (7), 6-7 (3), 7-6 (3), 6-3.

Germany's Anna-Lena Groenefeld and her partner Mark Knowles of the Bahamas won the mixed doubles final against top seeded Leander Paes of India (seen applauding in the background) and Cara Black of Zimbabwe, 7-5, 6-3 on the Centre Court at Wimbledon, Sunday, July 5, 2009. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)