Gustavo Kuerten
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Gustavo Kuerten
Nobody saw him coming in 1997. Gustavo Kuerten arrived at Roland Garros ranked No. 66, unseeded, playing his third Grand Slam, and left as champion, beating three former Paris winners on the way: Thomas Muster and Yevgeny Kafelnikov in five sets each, then Sergi Bruguera in the final. The kid from Florianopolis played with a surfer's loose joy and a looping one-handed backhand built for red clay, and Paris adopted him on the spot.
He won Paris twice more, in 2000 and 2001, all 3 of his majors on the same clay. In 2000 he sealed year-end No. 1 at the Masters Cup in Lisbon, beating Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi back to back on indoor hard. In 2001 came the image that outlives the 20 career titles: match point saved against Michael Russell, then a heart carved into the clay with his racquet, Guga kneeling inside it. A hip that three surgeries could not fix wound everything down, and the farewell came where it began, on Chatrier in 2008.