He was born on 8 August 1981 in Basel. He received professional status in 1998, i.e. that he started his professional career at the age of 17. The Swiss played his first match in Tour starting July of the same year in Gstaad. Federer's opponent was an Argentinian Lucas Arnold Ker, who won 6: 4, 6: 4. Yet he wasn’t doomed from the start as pretty soon Roger Federer climbed to the top for many years and fans took delight in his refined game.

il.1 Sheet issued by the Swiss Post in 2007. Roger Federer – World’s # 1 player for 161 consecutive weeks.

il.2 FDC of this edition with additional Austrian stamp dedicated to Federer

He has ensuredrecord-breaking 20 victories in Grand Slam tournaments. He triumphed at the Australian Open in 2004, 2006, 2007, 2010, 2017 and 2018. In France, at Roland Garros tournament he won in 2009. Winning Wimbledon in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012 and 2017, and in the US Open in 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 seasons. In addition, he was the champion of the season-ending ATP Finals tournament 6 times (2003, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2010, 2011). Also, he has reached the Grand Slam finals ten times and four times the ATP Finals.

As you can see from this extensive list, he failed to win four Grand Slam tournaments in one year. He also did not win the gold medal of the Olympic Games individually. In August 2012, he won a silver medal in London after losing the final to Andy Murray. Instead, he is the gold medalist of 2008 Beijing Double Games where together with Stanislas Wawrinka in the final he defeated the Swedes, Simon Aspelin and Thomas Johansson.

il.3 The 2010 FDC envelope of the Austrian Post. The issue commemorating the successes of Roger Federer including: 16 Grand Slam tournaments won and the gold medal in doubles at the Beijing Olympics.

Roger Federer is a longtime leader of the ATP ranking. After winning the 2004 Australian Open, on February 2, he was promoted to the 1st position in the world ranking. For the next 237 weeks he was at the top of the list (until 11 August 2008). After less than a year's break, on 6 July2009, he became the leader of the ranking again for a period of 48 weeks. After two years, on 9 July 2012, Federer again took the lead in the ranking which evened Pete Sampras’ record and the following week he broke the 286 week record as No. 1. He stayed there until November 5, 2012, when was replaced by Novak Djoković as the leader. On 19 February 2018, after a five-year and four-month break, Roger Federer returned to the 1st position in the ATP world ranking at the age of 36 and six months, becoming the oldest leader in history. In total, he led the tennis players during a record-breaking 310 weeks.

Over his whole career, Federer has won 103 ATP Tour single tournaments and reached 54 finals. As the third tennis player in the history of the open era he reached the limit of a thousand winning matches. In doubles the Swiss has won 8 tournaments and reached 6 finals. In 2014 season, he won the historic Davis Cup, Switzerland’s first, after beating France 3:1 in the final.

il.4,5,6 Occasional spreadsheets with a fixed margin for the Australian Open in 2007, 2008 and 2010 for personalized stamps. Among the tennis stars is the multiple winner of this event Roger Federer.

I took information from Wikipedia.

Illustrations are ​​from my own collection (partly a continuation of the Karl-Josef Schlömer collection)

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