Ernests Gulbis

Infobox Tennis player
playername= Ernests Gulbis


nickname = "The Gull", "Ernie"
country = LAT
residence= Jūrmala, Latvia
datebirth= birth date and age|1988|8|30
placebirth= Riga, USSR
height= height|m=1.90
weight= convert|76|kg|lb|abbr=on
turnedpro= 2004
plays= Right-handed; two-handed backhand
careerprizemoney=$814,392
singlesrecord= 34 - 36
singlestitles= 0
highestsinglesranking= 38 (August 4, 2008)
AustralianOpenresult= 1st (2008)
FrenchOpenresult= QF (2008)
Wimbledonresult= 2nd (2008)
USOpenresult= 4th (2007)
Othertournaments = Yes
Olympicsresult = 1R (2008)
doublesrecord= 9 - 8
doublestitles= 1
highestdoublesranking= 160 (June 25, 2007)
updated= September 30, 2008

Ernests Gulbis (pronounced|ˈærnəsts ˈgulbis, born August 30, 1988) is a Latvian professional tennis player. As of August 18, 2008, he is ranked 50th in the world for singles. In 2008, Gulbis won his first ATP Tour doubles title in Houston, teaming with Rainer Schuettler. His career highlights also include a quarterfinal appearance at the 2008 French Open, where he lost a tight match to Novak Djokovic, and a 4th round appearance at the 2007 US Open, upsetting two seeds along the way.

Gulbis is coached by Karl Heinz Wetter. He used to be coached by Nikola Pilić, the former professional Croatian tennis player and Croatian and German Davis Cup captain, and began training at the Niki Pilic Tennis Academy in Germany at the age of 12. [ [http://www.sportinglife.com/story_get.cgi?STORY_NAME=tennis/07/05/28/TENNIS_French_Henman_Nightle.html 'Gulbis has weight on his shoulders'] ]

Personal life

Gulbis first started playing tennis with his grandmother and considers basketball, football and hockey as his favorite sports. His father, Ainārs, is an investment businessman and his mother, Milēna, is a theater actress. The second of five children, Gulbis has three sisters (Elīna, Laura and Monika) and one younger brother named Kristaps. [ [http://www.itftennis.com/mens/players/player.asp?player=100028679 Ernests Gulbis at ITFtennis.com] ] Gulbis comes from a sporting family and his grandfather, Alvils, was one of the starting five players on ASK Rīga, the Soviet Union basketball team that won the European Championships. [http://www.usopen.org/en_US/news/interviews/2007-09-04/200709041188949871343.html An Interview with Ernests Gulbis: Round 4 US Open 2007] ] His other grandfather, Uldis Pūcītis, was a popular actor and film director. He comes from a very wealthy family.

Gulbis speaks three languages: Latvian, Russian, English and a little German.

Tennis career

The highlights of his career up to 2006 are: reaching the final of the Oberstaufen Challenger in July 2006, where he lost to Michal Tabara; reaching the final of the Tampere Challenger, also in July 2006, where he lost to Florian Mayer; reaching the semi-finals of [http://www.spbopen.ru/eng/ ATP St. Petersburg Open] as a wildcard in October, where he lost to Mario Ančić; and winning the Eckental Challenger in November, where he defeated Philipp Petzschner. In the 2008 US Open second round, Gulbis played a grueling 4 setter against Andy Roddick, yet lost. Later when interviewed, it was discovered that both he and his American opponent shared a birthday the moment the match rolled past midnight and into the early hours of the next day, August 30th.

2007

Gulbis started his season as a qualifier in the [http://www.medibankinternational.com/ Sydney Medibank International] , losing in the first round to Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus. [ [http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21029781-2722,00.html 'Baghdatis conquers jet lag, rookie'] ] He was subsequently defeated in the first qualifying round of the Australian Open.

Gulbis was relatively successful on the Challenger circuit in 2007. He reached the quarterfinals in Bergamo (l. to Fabrice Santoro) and the semifinals in Heilbronn (l. to Michael Llodra). Gulbis won his second Challenger title by triumphing over the local favorite, Edouard Roger-Vasselin, at the [http://www.tmi.fft.fr/atp.besancon Besançon Challenger] in France, enabling him to break into the ATP Top 100 for the first time in his career. In his next tournament, the [http://www.saopen.ba/ Sarajevo Challenger] , Gulbis emerged victorious in both the singles and doubles events.

In the first week of October, he won the Mons Challenger in Belgium (d. Kristof Vliegen) as the top seed, breaking into the AP Top 50 for the first time in his career and surpassing Juan Martin Del Potro as the highest-ranked player born in 1988. This win also meant a fourth, consecutive title, which drew some attention to him by tennis pundits.

Grand Slam debut

Gulbis announced his arrival on the Grand Slam stage in the 2007 French Open by defeating the British veteran, Tim Henman in straight sets to advance to the second round. It was heralded by the British Davis Cup captain, John Lloyd, as "... a brilliant performance from Gulbis, that is just pure and utter talent." [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tennis/6700439.stm 'Gulbis vs Henman: as it happens...' from BBC Sports] ] Gulbis' run was halted in the second round by Spaniard Álbert Montañés, with a 1–6, 2–6, 6–1, 6–7(3) defeat, in a rain-interrupted match.

At Wimbledon, his second Grand Slam participation, Gulbis again was drawn to face Marcos Baghdatis in the first round. He succeeded in winning the first set off the tenth-seeded Cypriot before succumbing in four sets. [ [http://www.wimbledon.org/en_GB/news/match_reports/2007-06-26/200706261182889541156.html 'No trouble or stubble for Baghdatis'] ] Gulbis debuted in Grand Slam doubles by teaming up with Ivan Ljubičić, with whom he had reached the semi-finals of the 2007 Ordina Open.

At the 2007 U.S. Open, Gulbis upset the No. 30 seed, Potito Starace, in the first round and the No. 8 seed, Tommy Robredo, in the third round, winning by a convincing score of 6–1, 6–3, 6–2. In that match, Gulbis broke Robredo six times and had 39 winners to Robredo's seven. [ [http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/tennis/usopen07/news/story?page=notebookuso070902 'Gulbis gobbles up Robredo in 91 minutes'] ] Gulbis' fine run was finally halted by former world Number 1, Carlos Moya, to whom he lost in four sets. [ [http://www.usopen.org/en_US/bios/cmatch/ms/atpg858.html US Open 2007 results] ]

2008

At the first round of the 2008 Australian Open, Gulbis lost to Marat Safin 0–6, 4–6, 6–7. He reached the second round of the 2008 Pacific Life Open, where he lost a tight match to former Grand Slam finalist David Nalbandian with the score of 6–4, 4–6, 7–6⁴. At one point he was up a break in the third set, having served out the previous game with 4 aces, but he eventually lost the match in the tiebreak. In the first round of the 2008 Miami Masters, he defeated Dominik Hrbatý, but in the second round met Nikolay Davydenko. After winning the first set 6-3, he lost the following two sets in tiebreaks.

His biggest result to date occurred when he reached the quarterfinals of the 2008 French Open. Through the tournament he beat Simon Greul, seventh seed James Blake, Nicolas Lapentti and home-favourite Michael Llodra. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/tennis/7430053.stm Nadal and Djokovic into last eight (BBC - Accessed on June 3 2008)] In the quarterfinals he lost to the third seed Novak Djokovic in a tight match with the score line 5-7, 6³-7, 5-7.

In his next tournament, he reached the third round of the 2008 Queen's Club Championships, beating Kristof Vliegen and 12th seed Andreas Seppi. He lost to 6th seed Andy Murray with 7-5, 1-6, 4-6.

In the first round at Wimbledon, Gulbis defeated 6'10" American John Isner.he lost in the 2nd round to the 2nd seed and eventual champion Rafael Nadal with a score line of 5-7, 6-2, 7-6², 6-3. Other than Roger Federer, he was the only player to take a set off the eventual champion. In a post match interview, Nadal noted how difficult the return game against Gulbis' serve was, and that he felt Ernests was going to run away with the match if it wasn't for a rain delay that transpired.

Gulbis defeated Jarkko Nieminen, Arnaud Clement, and James Blake at the 2008 Cincinnati Masters but lost in the quarterfinal to Novak Djokovic 6-3, 6-4.

In the US Open, Gulbis defeated Thomas Johansson in the first round but lost to Andy Roddick in the second round 3-6, 7-5, 6-2, 7-5 on his and Andy's birthday.

Davis Cup

Gulbis has played in three Davis Cup ties for Latvia this year, winning all seven of the rubbers in which he participated (4 singles; 3 doubles with Deniss Pavlovs). [ [http://www.daviscup.com/ties/tie.asp?tie=100009001 Latvia vs Bulgaria - Davis Cup tie details] ] [ [http://www.daviscup.com/ties/tie.asp?tie=100009007 Latvia vs Finland - Davis Cup tie details] ] [http://www.daviscup.com/ties/tie.asp?tie=100009010 Latvia vs Monaco - Davis Cup tie details] ] His participation in the tie against Monaco in September helped Latvia to qualify for the Europe/Africa Zone Group I tier of Davis Cup for the first time in its history.

Playing Style

Gulbis primarily employs an offensive baseline playing style, although is fairly comfortable playing from all court positions. Gulbis' most consistent shot is his forehand, which has been likened to that of American James Blake's for its rapid pace and relatively flat execution; his forehand is taken with a medium swing and with high levels of wrist action, which attributes to the explosive nature of the shot. His arsenal of forehand shots is nearly complete, and thus can be extremely disruptive and turn a defensive position into an offensive one. His running forehand has a slice action, but consistently lands extremely deep in the court, allowing for adequate recoil time to regain court position. Gulbis also has a particularly excellent array of finesse shots, including the high lob and drop shot, both of which he can strike from any position, including from deep in the court. Gulbis' primary weakness is his backhand, which while remaining adequately deep tends to lack variety, unless a particularly advantageous situation presents itself. Gulbis' foot speed is only moderate, although his return of serve is varied and dangerous, particularly on second serves and, due to his height, kick serves. In his televised matches in 2007 and early 2008 his serve would have been described as moderate, but has recently vastly improved in speed and variety, having served out several games with no returns against the incredible returners David Nalbandian and Rafael Nadal.

Despite having prodigious talent for his age, Gulbis can be prone to nervousness when down in a set or match, which can cause tight matches to be more mentally straining on him. Similarly to Marat Safin, Gulbis' playing style is extremely tactical and aggressive, and relies more on making winners than drawing errors, which can sometimes lead to a very high unforced error count.

Record against the top players

As of 2 October, 2008, Gulbis win-loss record against certain players who have been ranked World No. 20 or higher when the match was played is as follows:
*Mario Ancic 1-1
*Marcos Baghdatis 0-2
*James Blake 2-0
*Guillermo Canas 0-1
*Nikolay Davydenko 0-2
*Novak Djokovic 0-2
*David Ferrer 0-1
*Carlos Moya 1-1
*Andy Murray 0-1
*Rafael Nadal 0-2
*David Nalbandian 0-1
*Tommy Robredo 1-0
*Andy Roddick 0-1
*Mikhail Youzhny 0-1

ATP Tour titles

ingles (0)

Doubles (1)

Doubles (3)

Notes

External links

*
* [http://ernestsgulbisfr.gd/ 'A website about Ernests Gulbis'(in English and in French) ]
* [http://ernestsgulbis.wordpress.com/ 'The Importance of Being Ernests' - An Ernests Gulbis website]
* [http://steveghelper.com/MatchResults.php?players=Gulbis&weeks=12 Gulbis Recent Match Results]
* [http://steveghelper.com/RankingHistory.php?player=Gulbis Gulbis World Ranking History]
* [http://www.tennisinsight.com/playerid1384.htm Ernests Gulbis statistics at tennisinsight.com]
* [http://www.daviscup.com/teams/player.asp?player=100028679 Ernests Gulbis Davis Cup statistics]