Mark Hilton (born 20 April 1981) is a tennis coach and former professional
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball cov ...
player from Chester, England.
Career
As a junior, Hilton won the national championships at U16 and U18 level.
Hilton's highest world ranking was 62 ITF. Hilton made the semi-finals of the boys' doubles event at the
1999 Wimbledon Championships
The 1999 Wimbledon Championships was a tennis tournament played on grass courts at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in Wimbledon, London in the United Kingdom. It was the 113th edition of the Wimbledon Championships and were held fro ...
. He and partner
James Nelson lost narrowly 15–17 to
Guillermo Coria
Guillermo Sebastián Coria (born 13 January 1982), nicknamed ''El Mago'' (''The Magician'' in Spanish), is an Argentine retired professional tennis player. He reached a career-high ATP world No. 3 singles ranking in May 2004. Coria achieved his ...
and
David Nalbandian
David Pablo Nalbandian (; born 1 January 1982) is an Argentine retired professional tennis player who played on the ATP Tour from 2000 until his retirement in 2013. He reached the highest ranking in singles of world No. 3 in March 2006. Nalban ...
in the final set of their semi-final.
Hilton upset
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. He ...
at the
2004 Wimbledon Championships
The 2004 Wimbledon Championships was a tennis tournament played on grass courts at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club in Wimbledon, London in the United Kingdom. It was the 118th edition of the Wimbledon Championships and were held fr ...
, to make the second round, where he lost to
Dominik Hrbatý
Dominik Hrbatý (; born 4 January 1978) is a Slovakian former professional tennis player. Hrbatý reached the semifinals of the 1999 French Open – Men's singles, 1999 French Open, and achieved a career-high singles ranking of world No. 12 in ...
.
In the men's doubles, with
Jonathan Marray
Jonathan Marray (born 10 March 1981) is a former British tennis player and a Wimbledon Men's Doubles champion. Marray is a former top 20 doubles player, reaching a career high of world no. 15 in January 2013, mainly due to more regular appeara ...
in 2005 they defeated the French pairing of
Julien Benneteau
Julien Henry Guy Benneteau-Desgrois (; born 20 December 1981) is a French retired professional tennis player. His career-high singles ranking is ATP world no. 25, which he reached in November 2014. He formerly resided in Boulogne-Billancourt and ...
and
Nicolas Mahut
Nicolas Pierre Armand Mahut (; born 21 January 1982) is a French professional tennis player who is a former world No. 1 in doubles.
He is a five-time Grand Slam champion in doubles, having completed the career Grand Slam with victories at the ...
.
[ They then lost in the second round to ]Ivo Karlović
Ivo Karlović (; born 28 February 1979) is a former Croatian professional tennis player. His height of 211 cm (6 ft 11 in) makes him the joint tallest ranked tennis player in history, along with Reilly Opelka. He has won eight ATP sin ...
and Rogier Wassen
Rogier Wassen (born 9 August 1976) is a Dutch tennis player who competed regularly on the ATP Tour primarily as a doubles player.
Wassen reached his highest doubles ranking on the ATP Tour on 10 September 2007 when he became World No. 24. The r ...
.[
Hilton made 2 ATP Singles Challenger finals. He won three ]ATP Challenger
The ATP Challenger Tour, known until the end of 2008 as the ATP Challenger Series, is a series of international men's professional tennis tournaments. The Challenger Tour events are the second-highest tier of tennis competition, behind the ATP T ...
doubles titles in 2005, with Marray.[ His final professional tennis match was in November 2005.
In 2005, at the age of 24, Hilton decided to retire. With a singles career high ranking of 202 in June 2005, he had ambitions to be a tennis coach on the ATP Tour.
Hilton began coaching in 2006, completing his coaching qualifications and working with junior players, Daniel Evans, George Morgan and Luke Bambridge. In 2011, Hilton began work as ]Liam Broady
Liam Tarquin Broady (born 4 January 1994) is a tennis player and current British No. 6. In 2010, he won the Boys' Doubles at Wimbledon with Tom Farquharson, and the Boys' Doubles at the Australian Open with Joshua Ward-Hibbert, as well as reach ...
's coach. He became employed by the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) in 2012 when Broady joined the Lawn Tennis Association
The Lawn Tennis Association (LTA) is the national governing body of tennis in Great Britain, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.
Founded in 1888, the LTA promotes all levels of lawn tennis. It believes that tennis can provide "physical ...
against his father's wishes, and the Broadys did not speak to each other for several years. In October 2015, Hilton and Broady agreed to end their coaching relationship.
During Hilton's coaching, Liam Broady reached a junior career high ranking of number 2 in the world in March 2012. Liam Broady made the final of junior Wimbledon in 2011 and the final of the US Open juniors in 2012. Liam Broady won the Australian Open junior doubles title in 2012 with Joshua Ward Hibbert. Liam reached a career high senior ranking of 158 ATP in August 2015.
In November 2015 Hilton started coaching Dan Evans.
Challenger titles
Doubles: (3)
References
External links
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1981 births
Living people
English male tennis players
Sportspeople from Chester
British male tennis players
Tennis people from Cheshire
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