She surprised everyone by saying goodbye at the age of 25: Who is Ashleigh Barty?

Her full name is Ashleigh Barty, but her circle and sports media prefer to call her "Ash".

Born in Queensland, Australia, the young tennis player is the third daughter of a British immigrant radiologist mother and an Australian civil servant father.

There is someone she met when she was 4 years old, whom she regards as her second father and befriends: career coach Jim Joyce. Joyce adopted Ash so much that he kept all of Ash's photographs (taken by herself) from her childhood to the present in his personal room. He sensed her light in her first training session. When he first threw the ball to Ash, she received a very technical hit and saw the hope in her.

Ashleigh Jacinta Barty (born 24 April 1996) is an Australian former professional tennis player and cricketer. She was the second Australian tennis player to be ranked world No. 1 in singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA), holding the ranking for 121 weeks overall. She was also a top-10 player in doubles, having achieved a career-high ranking of No. 5 in the world. Barty is a three-time Grand Slam singles champion, claiming titles at the 2019 French Open, the 2021 Wimbledon Championships, and the 2022 Australian Open. She is also a major doubles champion, having won the 2018 US Open with CoCo Vandeweghe. Barty won 15 singles titles and 12 doubles titles on the WTA Tour.

If we just call Ash a "tennis player" we would be doing her an injustice. Because she is a complete athlete, an athlete. Netball, cricket, golf, tennis, archery… It's all about it.

In addition to tennis, which she started when she was only four years old, she also started playing netball, but the sexist attitude of netball alienated her from this sport. It is claimed that she could not be successful in netball, especially in the competition with her sisters, and that's why she focused all her attention on tennis for a while. Of course, these are just claims.

She adjusted her focus so well that she started playing against adults as a child. It was obvious from those days that she would make Jim Joyce proud. Her career, which was on the rise until 2014, came to a turning point. She announced that she was quitting professional tennis after the 2014 US Open, which she attended when she was 18 years old. I think you can imagine how upset Jim Joyce was.

Every great career can have such overwhelming periods. Ash experienced these too. Just like Michael Jordan... I think she wanted to see herself in a more successful position when she came to that period and made such a decision out of disappointment. It was said that the match in which she lost to Sharapova had a big impact on this decision. Does she regret the past at this point now? I do not think so.

There is also a short-term cricket adventure. After taking tennis out of her life and resting for a while, she returned, but not to tennis. She started playing cricket and took up this sport professionally for the first time at that time.

However, the professionalism of her tennis career, which she has been interested in for a long time, helped her in the transition process. Ash, who showed cricket performance with not-bad statistics, returned to tennis after sweating for the Brisbane Heat for about two years.

In 2016, Ash Barty's tennis career was starting for the second time, but with one important change. Her new coach was Craig Tyzzer. In the new period, she participated in more tournaments, played more determinedly and managed to make her name known to the whole world last week. She became the first Australian to win Wimbledon after Evonne Goalong Cawley, who won it in 1980.

In the final, she defeated Czech tennis player Carolina Pliskova with scores of 6-3, 6-7 (4-7), 6-3 and became one of the new faces of Wimbledon.

Ash is a true animal friend. She has a lot of dogs. She grew up with cats and dogs. It was always a pet that her family adopted, and the crowded population never caused any problems. Whether she lost or won, she hugged them when she returned home.

There is almost no job that Ash hasn't touched. She was a professional barista and had a passion for coffee. There are so many posts on Instagram where she is photographed drinking coffee!

She literally kisses the coffee. She did not forget to write Coffee Lover in her Instagram bio. Her posts mostly consist of things listed in her bio, and she has a profile that gives the impression of being a "winner".

March 2022

Ashleigh Barty, who became the world number 1 in women's singles after her retirement at Roland Garros, the first Grand Slam she won in her career in 2019, quit tennis once again, although she is only 25 years old. The Australian racket, who made history in January and achieved a first for her country after 44 years, stunned the tennis world with this decision.

The 25-year-old Australian racket started the season with a cup by winning the Australian Open Tennis Tournament, the first grand slam tournament of the season, and became the first Australian to win the Australian Open in 44 years.

She was in first place for 114 weeks

Since Ashleigh Barty won her first Grand Slam tournament at the 2019 French Open, she had been at number one in the women's rankings for 114 weeks until March 2022.

Only Stefi Graff, Serena Williams (both 186 weeks), and Martina Navratilova (156 weeks) have been at the top longer than her.

Barty is the only female tennis player, other than Williams, who has won major tournaments on both grass, clay and hard courts among the athletes whose career continues.

The amount of prizes she won in tournaments by the age of 25 exceeded 23 million dollars.

July 2023

Ashleigh Barty gave birth to a boy

Barty, who surprised tennis fans with her retirement decision at the top of the world rankings in March 2022, when she was only 25 years old, this time came to the fore with good news.

Barty's husband, Australian golfer Garry Kissick, shared the photo of the baby they named "Hayden" on her social networking site Instagram account and said, "Our wonderful child... Hayden, welcome to the world."

Barty, who was at the top of the women's singles world rankings for 121 weeks in her career, won 3 grand slam championships, including the 2019 French Open, 2021 Wimbledon and 2022 Australian Open.

The 27-year-old former tennis player, who decided to retire at an early age in order to spend more time with her family and focus on new sports, announced that she was pregnant in January.