Tennis icon Serena Williams just announced that she will be retiring from the sport right after the US Tennis Open later this month in a moving essay she wrote for Vogue magazine.
In the essay she wrote for the American fashion magazine yesterday (Tuesday), she said that she never liked the word retirement, and instead, she was 'evolving away from tennis'. "I’m here to tell you that I’m evolving away from tennis, toward other things that are important to me. A few years ago I quietly started Serena Ventures, a venture capital firm. Soon after that, I started a family. I want to grow that family," she wrote.
Serena said that she didn't want to abandon the sport that made her a household name, and acknowledged the burden that many professional women have to bear sometimes.
"Believe me, I never wanted to have to choose between tennis and a family. I don’t think it’s fair," she said, adding, "If I were a guy, I wouldn’t be writing this because I’d be out there playing and winning while my wife was doing the physical labor of expanding our family."
Here are some of her best moments from prior Vogue Magazine shoots.
Photographed with her sister Venus Williams by Annie Leibovitz for Vogue in May 1998.
Photographed by Annie Leibovitz for Vogue in April 2003.
A 17-year-old Serena WIlliams celebrates winning against Martina Hingis of Switzerland to win her first US Open title at the women's final of the U.S. Open in 1999.
In 2003, Serena Williams defeated her sister Venus in the women's final at the Australian Open in Melbourne on Jan. 25.
She won the women's final at the Wimbledon Tennis Championships in London on July 5, also in 2003, once again defeating her sister Venus.
After winning the women's final match against Justine Henin of Belgium during the 2010 Australian Open in Australia, Serena celebrated by throwing her tennis racket in the air and lay down on the tennis court.
In 2013, Serena Williams defeated fellow tennis icon Maria Sharapova of Russia during the French Open on June 8.
In 2017, Serena Williams won the Australian Open tennis championships after defeating her sister Venus. Serena was 2 months pregnant at the time.