“Road to success”- The career trajectories of top 10 professional tennis players: International Tennis Federation, 20th ITF Worldwide Coaches Conference

Learning from the career trajectories of successful professional tennis players is central to informing effective strategy, policy and practice to maximize player development. This paper aims to examine the career milestones of top professional tennis players, utilizing this information to forecast a player’s career peak ranking. Thirty-years of longitudinal data which included 82 top 10 professional ranked players between 2007 to 2017, were analyzed. Gender and generational differences were compared. The results revealed firstly that top 10 players of both genders spent approximately two years on average from their first appearance on the ITF junior circuit to obtaining their first professional ranking, then a further three years to achieve a top 100 ranking, and finally a further four years to attain a top 10 world ranking. Secondly, the ages at which a player participated in their first pro-circuit tournament and other ranking milestones were moderately correlated with a player’s career high ranking, accounting for 32% variation. Accompanying discriminant analyses revealed that 61% of the top one players could be effectively “predicted” to be top one players. Lastly, early competitive success at a high junior level of competition was shown to be a critical precursor to future professional success. The implication of career benchmarks based on age was further discussed when assessing and monitoring player development.