Diede de Groot Just Won Her 3rd Wimbledon Title, and She Could Make Paralympic History

Tennis player Diede de Groot's career goals, according to her website [1], are to stay No. 1 in the world, to win multiple Grand Slam, and to become an Paralympic champion. The 24-year-old from the Netherlands has already made a major dent in those goals — actually, she's nearly crushed them.

She is currently the top-ranked player in women's wheelchair tennis [2], and she's won three singles titles in every Grand Slam — Wimbledon (2017, 2018, 2021), Australian Open (2018, 2019, 2021), US Open (2018, 2019, 2020) — except for the French Open, where she came out victorious twice in 2019 and 2021. So far this year, she's won every Grand Slam she's entered. Her success is especially impressive given that she only made her Grand Slam debut in 2017 [3].

Aside from her 11 major singles wins, de Groot has racked up doubles titles at all four Grand Slams and won singles titles at the 2017 and 2018 Wheelchair Tennis Masters [4]. To top it all off, she claimed a doubles silver medal at the 2016 Paralympic Games. You can expect to see her at the Tokyo Paralympics this summer. If she wins a gold there plus a singles title at the 2021 US Open, she'll be the first athlete to achieve a Golden Grand Slam — claiming victory in all four Grand Slams and an Olympic Games within a single calendar year — in wheelchair tennis history [5], according to Paralympic.org.

Keep reading for some facts about de Groot that you may not know.

Diede de Groot Started Playing Tennis at Age 7

De Groot was born with a shorter right leg, and she started playing wheelchair tennis at age 7 because she needed to do rehabilitation [7] after hip operations [8]. "I had my first lesson [9], and I loved it straight away," she said in an International Tennis Federation mini documentary.

She Was Discovered by Dutch Wheelchair Legend Esther Vergeer

Vergeer, seen here and who retired in 2013 after winning 21 Grand Slam singles titles, acted as de Groot's mentor. "The mentoring wasn't so much on the court [10], but mainly off it," de Groot told Wimbledon.com. "Like how do you become a sports professional? How do you schedule your tournaments? Esther has been a big help in that."

The Silver Medal That de Groot Won in Rio Was Actually With Vergeer's Old Doubles Partner

Vergeer won the gold medal in the women's wheelchair doubles final at the 2012 Paralympic Games with partner Marjolein Buis. Four years later, Buis and de Groot won the silver in Rio.

She Has a Pug Named Nora

Look how cute!

Her Ab Workouts Look Intense!

De Groot does crunches and reverse crunches as a combo here — and holy abs!

She Was Nominated For a 2019 and 2020 Laureus World Sports Award

De Groot was nominated for the Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability category in 2019 along with other athletes like skier and cyclist Oksana Masters [11]. She was nominated for that same award in 2020; Masters won it that year [12].

She's Hoping For 2 Gold Medals at the Paralympic Games This Summer

"Tokyo was the goal and has been for four years," de Groot said in the video seen here. "I've really been training hard every day to perform very well at those Paralympics. I ultimately want to reach two gold medals. I don't know if that's possible, but I really want to perform well, and hopefully I can manage to win."

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