Athletes Often View

ATHLETES OFTEN VIEW tears as a sign of weakness. But in the 1999 French Open, one finalist cried with happiness and excitement, while the other wept with heartache and disappointment.

Five-time champion Steffi Graf faced No. 1 Martina Hingis for the Grand Slam tennis title. Prior to the event, Graf had announced her retirement. The 1999 appearance at Roland Garros would be her last.

Despite a tantrum-induced warning, the 18-year-old Hingis took the first set 6–4 from her 29-year-old German counterpart. But with a 2–0 lead in set two, the Swiss player erupted into a tirade. After stroking a baseline shot long, she stormed over to Graf’s side of the court and pointed to a spot she insisted the ball had hit. Umpire Anne Lasserre awarded Graf a penalty point for Hingis’s outburst.

Hingis regrouped and moved to within three points of taking the match. But Graf reeled off 23 of the next 26 points, winning the second set 7–5. Feeding her opponent a steady diet of low slice backhands, the German forced Hingis into sloppy strokes. Graf coasted to a 6–2 victory in set three, claiming her 22nd Grand Slam championship.

At the conclusion, Graf wept for joy and called the French Open championship the biggest of her stellar career. Hingis, on the other hand, rushed to her mother in the stands and cried. Only at her mom’s insistence did she return to Court Centrale to receive the runner-up plate.

EXTRA < < < < < < < < < < < < < <

POINT Steffi Graf concluded her French Open career with a mature attitude and a hard-fought victory. The young Martina Hingis lost her cool—and the match. Her immaturity and poor sportsmanship showed. Graf’s tears of joy provided a marked contrast to Hingis’s tantrum tears.

Tears represent emotion—whether joy or sorrow, frustration or anger. The Bible talks about Jesus crying. When his friend Lazarus died and Jesus saw Lazarus’s sisters, Mary and Martha, and other people crying, God’s Son cried too. Then he raised Lazarus from the dead. Jesus turned those tears at a funeral from sadness to gladness.

GOAL! Think about the last time you cried. What emotions triggered the tears? Thank God for the release tears can bring. And praise him that he knows what it’s like to cry.