The ATP Champions Tour is a men's tennis tour intended for former tennis professionals, who have since retired from mainstream professional tennis touring (The
ATP). The Tour brings together many of the greatest tennis players in history for nostalgic, competitive and entertaining tournaments in cities around the world.
For a player to be eligible for play on this tour, he must be in the year of his 35th birthday or have been retired from the
ATP World Tour
The ATP Tour is a worldwide top-tier tennis tour for men organized by the Association of Tennis Professionals. The second-tier tour is the ATP Challenger Tour and the third-tier is the ITF Men's World Tennis Tour. The equivalent women's organi ...
for two years or more. Each player must have been either a
world No. 1, a Grand Slam finalist, or a singles player in a winning
Davis Cup team. Each event can also invite two players of its choice to take wild cards.
The Tour usually consists of around 10 events around the world, with a year-ending "My World Champions Tennis" event held at the
Royal Albert Hall in London. Events are typically played over four days with eight-man fields competing against each other in a round-robin format, ensuring that all players feature in at least three matches. The players are split into two groups of four. The top player from each group contests the final, while the two players who finish second in each group play off for third and fourth places respectively.
Matches are contested over the best of three sets, with the deciding set taking the form of a Champions tie-break. The Champions tie-break is an expanded version of the conventional professional tennis tie-break, whereby the winner is the first player to reach 10 points and lead by a margin of 2.
Rankings points on the Tour are distributed as follows: Winner: 400 / Runner-up: 300 / 3rd place: 200 / 4th place: 150 / No. 5-6: 80 / No. 7-8: 60 points.
Notable participants, in past and present, are:
John McEnroe
John Patrick McEnroe Jr. (born February 16, 1959) is an American former professional tennis player. He was known for his shot-making and volleying skills, his rivalries with Björn Borg and Jimmy Connors, and his confrontational on-court beha ...
,
Björn Borg,
Mats Wilander
Mats Arne Olof Wilander (; born 22 August 1964) is a Swedish former world No. 1 tennis player. From 1982 to 1988, he won seven major singles titles (three at the French Open, three at the Australian Open, and one at the US Open), and one major ...
,
Henri Leconte
Henri Leconte (born 4 July 1963) is a French former professional tennis player. He reached the men's singles final at the French Open in 1988, won the French Open men's doubles title in 1984, and helped France win the Davis Cup in 1991. Leconte ...
,
Pete Sampras,
Mansour Bahrami
Mansour Bahrami ( fa, منصور بهرامی; born 26 April 1956) is a former professional tennis player. He is Iranian with dual French nationality since 1989. While only moderately successful on the ATP Tour, his showmanship has made him a lo ...
,
Stefan Edberg,
Boris Becker,
Jim Courier
James Spencer "Jim" Courier (born August 17, 1970) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He won four major singles titles, two at the French Open and two at the Australian Open. He was the youngest man to reach the singles finals of ...
,
Thomas Muster
Thomas Muster (born 2 October 1967) is an Austrian former world No. 1 tennis player. One of the world's leading clay court players in the 1990s, he won the 1995 French Open and at his peak was called "The King of Clay". In addition, he won eig ...
,
Marcelo Ríos
Marcelo Andrés Ríos Mayorga (; born 26 December 1975) is a Chilean former world No. 1 tennis player. Nicknamed ''"El Chino"'' ("The Chinese") and ''"El zurdo de Vitacura"'' ("The Lefty from Vitacura"), he became the first Latin American play ...
,
Goran Ivanišević
Goran Ivanišević (; born 13 September 1971) is a Croatian former professional tennis player and current coach. He is the only player to win a Wimbledon singles title as a wildcard. He achieved this in 2001 while ranked world No. 125, after ...
,
Yevgeny Kafelnikov
Yevgeny Aleksandrovich Kafelnikov ( rus, Евгений Александрович Кафельников, , jɪvˈɡʲenʲɪj ˈkafʲɪlʲnʲɪkəf, a=Ru-Yevgeny-Kafelnikov.ogg; born 18 February 1974) is a Russian former world No. 1 tennis p ...
,
Patrick Rafter
Patrick Michael Rafter (born 28 December 1972) is an Australian former world No. 1 tennis player. He reached the top Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) singles ranking on 26 July 1999. His career highlights include consecutive US Open ...
,
Ivan Lendl
Ivan Lendl (; born March 7, 1960) is a Czech–American former professional tennis player. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time. Lendl was ranked world No. 1 in singles for 270 weeks and won 94 singles titles. ...
,
Carlos Moyá
Carlos Moyá Llompart (; born 27 August 1976) is a Spanish former world No. 1 tennis player. He was the French Open singles champion in 1998 and was the singles runner-up at the 1997 Australian Open. In 2004, he was part of his country's succ ...
,
Jimmy Connors,
Tim Henman
Timothy Henry Henman (born 6 September 1974) is a British former professional tennis player. Henman played a serve-and-volley style of tennis. He was the first British man to reach the singles semifinals of Wimbledon since Roger Taylor in th ...
and
Andy Roddick
Andrew Stephen Roddick (born 30 August 1982) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He is a major champion, having won the 2003 US Open. Roddick reached four other major finals ( Wimbledon in 2004, 2005, and 2009, and the US Ope ...
.
Participants
The following is a list of past participants on the ATP Champions Tour
*
Mansour Bahrami
Mansour Bahrami ( fa, منصور بهرامی; born 26 April 1956) is a former professional tennis player. He is Iranian with dual French nationality since 1989. While only moderately successful on the ATP Tour, his showmanship has made him a lo ...
*
Jeremy Bates
*
Boris Becker
*
James Blake
*
Björn Borg
*
Sergi Bruguera
Sergi Bruguera i Torner (; born 16 January 1971) is a former professional tennis player from Spain. He won consecutive men's singles titles at the French Open in 1993 and 1994, a silver medal at the 1996 Olympic Games in men's singles and reache ...
*
Omar Camporese
*
Pat Cash
Patrick Hart Cash (born 27 May 1965) is an Australian former professional tennis player. He reached a career-high ATP singles ranking of world No. 4 in May 1988 and a career-high ATP doubles ranking of world No. 6 in August 1988. Upon winning ...
*
Michael Chang
Michael Te-pei Chang (born February 22, 1972) is an American former professional tennis player and coach. He is the youngest man in history to win a singles major, winning the 1989 French Open at 17 years and 109 days old. Chang won a total of ...
*
José Luis Clerc
José Luis Clerc (born 16 August 1958) is a former professional tennis player from Argentina. He reached a career-high Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) world No. 4 singles ranking on 3 August 1981, following a run of 25 consecutive mat ...
*
Jimmy Connors
*
Albert Costa
Albert Costa i Casals (; born 25 June 1975) is a Spanish former professional tennis player. He is best remembered for winning the Men's Singles title at the French Open in 2002.
Tennis career
Costa began playing tennis at the age of five. H ...
*
Jim Courier
James Spencer "Jim" Courier (born August 17, 1970) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He won four major singles titles, two at the French Open and two at the Australian Open. He was the youngest man to reach the singles finals of ...
*
Marcos Daniel
Marcos Diniz Daniel (born July 4, 1978 in Passo Fundo, Rio Grande do Sul) is a retired professional tennis player from Brazil who turned professional in 1997. The right-hander reached his highest ATP singles ranking of World No. 56 in Septembe ...
*
Stefan Edberg
*
Younes El Aynaoui
Younes El Aynaoui ( ar, يونس العيناوي) (born 12 September 1971) is a former professional tennis player from Morocco.
He is a five-time singles winner on the ATP Tour and reached his career-high singles ranking of world No. 14 in Mar ...
*
Thomas Enqvist
Thomas Karl Johan Enqvist (born 13 March 1974) is a Swedish former professional tennis player. He reached the final of the 1999 Australian Open and won a total of 19 singles titles, including three Masters titles. He has a career high ATP world ...
*
Wayne Ferreira
Wayne Richard Ferreira (born 15 September 1971) is a South African former professional tennis player and current tennis coach.
Career
As a junior player, Ferreira was ranked world no. 1 junior doubles player and no. 6 junior singles player. He ...
*
Guy Forget
Guy Forget (; born 4 January 1965) is a French tennis administrator and retired professional player. During his career, he helped France win the Davis Cup in both 1991 and 1996. Since retiring as a player, he has served as France's Davis Cup te ...
*
Renzo Furlan
Renzo Furlan (born 17 May 1970) is a former tennis player from Italy.
Having turned professional in 1988, Furlan represented his native country at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, where he was defeated in the quarter finals by Indi ...
*
Brad Gilbert
*
Justin Gimelstob
Justin Jeremy Gimelstob (born January 26, 1977) is a retired American tennis player. Gimelstob has been a resident of Morristown, New Jersey, and as of 2009 lived in Santa Monica, California.
He was the top-ranked boy in his age group at the ag ...
*
Andrés Gómez
Andrés Gómez Santos (; born 27 February 1960) is an Ecuadorian former professional tennis player. He won the men's singles title at the French Open in 1990.
His son, Emilio Gómez, is a professional tennis player. His nephew Nicolás Lapent ...
*
Fernando Gonzalez
*
Magnus Gustafsson
Magnus Nils Gustafsson (born 3 January 1967) is a tennis coach and former top ten professional tennis player from Sweden. Gustafsson won 14 tour singles titles during his career and finished 15 consecutive seasons within the world's top 100, r ...
*
Paul Haarhuis
Paul Vincent Nicholas Haarhuis (born 19 February 1966) is a Dutch former professional tennis player. He is a former world No. 1 doubles player, having reached a career-high singles ranking of world No. 18 in November 1995. He won six Grand Sl ...
*
Tim Henman
Timothy Henry Henman (born 6 September 1974) is a British former professional tennis player. Henman played a serve-and-volley style of tennis. He was the first British man to reach the singles semifinals of Wimbledon since Roger Taylor in th ...
*
Goran Ivanišević
Goran Ivanišević (; born 13 September 1971) is a Croatian former professional tennis player and current coach. He is the only player to win a Wimbledon singles title as a wildcard. He achieved this in 2001 while ranked world No. 125, after ...
*
Anders Järryd
Anders Per Järryd (; born 13 July 1961) is a former professional tennis player from Sweden. During his career he won eight Grand Slam doubles titles (three French Open, two Wimbledon, two US Open, one Australian Open), reached the world No ...
*
Yevgeny Kafelnikov
Yevgeny Aleksandrovich Kafelnikov ( rus, Евгений Александрович Кафельников, , jɪvˈɡʲenʲɪj ˈkafʲɪlʲnʲɪkəf, a=Ru-Yevgeny-Kafelnikov.ogg; born 18 February 1974) is a Russian former world No. 1 tennis p ...
*
Petr Korda
Petr Korda (born 23 January 1968) is a Czech former professional tennis player. He won the 1998 Australian Open and was runner-up at the 1992 French Open, reaching a career-high ranking of No. 2 in February 1998. Korda tested positive for dopin ...
*
Richard Krajicek
*
Aaron Krickstein
Aaron Krickstein (born August 2, 1967), nicknamed "Marathon Man", is an American former professional tennis player who competed on the ATP Tour from 1983 to 1996. He currently competes on the Outback Champions Series Over-30 tour.
Krickstein ...
*
Magnus Larsson
Per Henrik ''Magnus'' Larsson (born 25 March 1970) is a former professional tennis player from Sweden.
Playing career
Larsson turned professional in 1989 and won his first top-level singles title at Florence in 1990. His first doubles title ...
*
Henri Leconte
Henri Leconte (born 4 July 1963) is a French former professional tennis player. He reached the men's singles final at the French Open in 1988, won the French Open men's doubles title in 1984, and helped France win the Davis Cup in 1991. Leconte ...
*
Ivan Lendl
Ivan Lendl (; born March 7, 1960) is a Czech–American former professional tennis player. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time. Lendl was ranked world No. 1 in singles for 270 weeks and won 94 singles titles. ...
*
Todd Martin
Todd Martin (born July 8, 1970) is an American retired tennis player. He reached the men's singles final at the 1994 Australian Open and the 1999 US Open and achieved a career-high singles ranking of world No. 4.
Playing career
Martin was born ...
*
Xavier Malisse
Xavier Malisse (born 19 July 1980) is a former Belgian professional tennis player. Born in the north-western Flemish city of Kortrijk and nicknamed ''X-Man'', he is one of only two Belgian men (the other being David Goffin) to have been ranked ...
*
John McEnroe
John Patrick McEnroe Jr. (born February 16, 1959) is an American former professional tennis player. He was known for his shot-making and volleying skills, his rivalries with Björn Borg and Jimmy Connors, and his confrontational on-court beha ...
*
Fernando Meligeni
Fernando Ariel Meligeni (born April 12, 1971), nicknamed ''Fininho'' (diminutive form in Portuguese for ''thin''), is a Brazilian former professional tennis player. He won 3 singles titles and reached the semi-finals of both the 1999 French Ope ...
*
Carlos Moyá
Carlos Moyá Llompart (; born 27 August 1976) is a Spanish former world No. 1 tennis player. He was the French Open singles champion in 1998 and was the singles runner-up at the 1997 Australian Open. In 2004, he was part of his country's succ ...
*
Thomas Muster
Thomas Muster (born 2 October 1967) is an Austrian former world No. 1 tennis player. One of the world's leading clay court players in the 1990s, he won the 1995 French Open and at his peak was called "The King of Clay". In addition, he won eig ...
*
Yannick Noah
Yannick Noah (; born 18 May 1960) is a French former professional tennis player and singer. Noah won the French Open in 1983, and is currently the captain of both France's Davis Cup and Billie Jean King Cup teams. During his nearly two-decade ...
*
Mikael Pernfors
Mikael Pernfors (born 16 July 1963) is a former professional tennis player from Sweden.
He reached the men's singles final at the French Open in 1986, and won the 1993 Canadian Open in Montreal.
Career
Pernfors played a topspin-heavy baselin ...
*
Mark Philippoussis
Mark Anthony Philippoussis ( ; born 7 November 1976) is an Australian former professional tennis player of Greek and Italian descent. Philippoussis' greatest achievements are winning two Davis Cup titles with Australia in 1999 and 2003, wi ...
*
Cédric Pioline
*
Patrick Rafter
Patrick Michael Rafter (born 28 December 1972) is an Australian former world No. 1 tennis player. He reached the top Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) singles ranking on 26 July 1999. His career highlights include consecutive US Open ...
*
Guillaume Raoux
Guillaume Raoux (born 14 February 1970) is a retired tennis player from France.
Career
Raoux reached the Wimbledon junior singles final in 1988. He turned professional in 1989.
Pro tour
The right-hander won one singles career title (Queensland ...
*
Marcelo Ríos
Marcelo Andrés Ríos Mayorga (; born 26 December 1975) is a Chilean former world No. 1 tennis player. Nicknamed ''"El Chino"'' ("The Chinese") and ''"El zurdo de Vitacura"'' ("The Lefty from Vitacura"), he became the first Latin American play ...
*
Andy Roddick
Andrew Stephen Roddick (born 30 August 1982) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He is a major champion, having won the 2003 US Open. Roddick reached four other major finals ( Wimbledon in 2004, 2005, and 2009, and the US Ope ...
*
Greg Rusedski
Gregory Rusedski (born 6 September 1973) is a British and Canadian former tennis player. He was the British No. 1 in 1997, 1999 and 2006, and reached the ATP ranking of world No. 4 for periods from 6 October 1997 to 12 October 1997 and from 25 ...
*
Marat Safin
Marat Mubinovich Safin ( rus, Мара́т Муби́нович Са́фин, , mɐˈrat ˈsafʲɪn, Ru-Marat-Safin.ogg; tt-Cyrl, Марат Мөбин улы Сафин; born 27 January 1980) is a Russian retired world No. 1 tennis player an ...
*
Pete Sampras
*
Fabrice Santoro
Fabrice Vetea Santoro (born 9 December 1972) is a French retired tennis player. Successful in both singles and doubles, he had an unusually long professional career, with many of his accomplishments coming toward the end of his career, and he is ...
*
Flávio Saretta
Flávio Saretta Filho (born June 28, 1980) is a former professional tennis player from Brazil who turned professional in 1998.
Tennis career
Saretta has won one ATP Tour doubles title, the 2004 Croatia Open Umag with José Acasuso, defeat ...
*
Carl-Uwe Steeb
Carl-Uwe Steeb (born 1 September 1967) is a former professional tennis player from Germany.
Steeb turned professional in 1986. He won his first top-level singles title in 1989 in Gstaad. His best singles performances at Grand Slam
Grand Slam mo ...
*
Michael Stich
Michael Detlef Stich (, ; born 18 October 1968) is a German former professional tennis player. He won the men's singles title at Wimbledon in 1991, the men's doubles titles at both Wimbledon and the Olympic Games in 1992, and was a singles r ...
*
Guillermo Vilas
Guillermo Vilas (; born 17 August 1952) is an Argentine former professional tennis player. Vilas was the No. 1 of the Grand Prix seasons in 1974, 1975 and 1977, and won four Grand Slam tournaments, one year-end Masters, nine Grand Prix Super Se ...
*
Mats Wilander
Mats Arne Olof Wilander (; born 22 August 1964) is a Swedish former world No. 1 tennis player. From 1982 to 1988, he won seven major singles titles (three at the French Open, three at the Australian Open, and one at the US Open), and one major ...
*
Mariano Zabaleta
Mariano Zabaleta (born 28 February 1978) is a retired professional male tennis player from Argentina. He had an unusual but effective service motion. His best shot was his forehand and his favourite surface was clay. Zabaleta's career highlights ...
Year-end number 1
Past finals
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
* Only 4 participants
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
* Only 4 participants.
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
References
External links
Official websiteChampions Tennis
{{DEFAULTSORT:Atp Champions Tour
Tennis tours and series
Men's tennis tournaments
Association of Tennis Professionals
Senior sports competitions
Masters tennis