Muster, Thomas

Thomas Muster, (born October 2, 1967, Leibnitz, Austria), Austrian tennis player who, at the 1995 French Open, became the first competitor from his country to win a Grand Slam tournament and who was one of the dominant clay court players in the 1990s.

Muster entered professional tennis in 1985, after finishing 10th in the 1984 world junior rankings. Four tournament titles in 1988 raised his Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) world ranking to 16th. On March 30, 1989, having just defeated Yannick Noah of France to advance to the finals of the Lipton International in Key Biscayne, Florida, and poised to solidify a spot in the top 10, Muster was unloading gear from the trunk of his car when it was struck by another car, severing the ligaments in his left knee. Surgery repaired the knee, but Muster’s ability to play professional tennis—or even walk comfortably—was uncertain.

Determined to return to the game, Muster, with the help of his coach, Ronald Leitgeb, designed a special chair from which he could hit tennis balls while his leg healed. Within six months Muster was back on the tour, and he finished the year ranked 21st in the world. With his career back on track, he began to establish a pattern: except for a 1990 title on the hard-court surface at Adelaide, Australia, every tournament he won was played on clay, where the slower pace of the game seemed to lessen the disadvantage of his weakened knee. He finished 1990 ranked seventh in the world, but his mastery of the clay court was just beginning.

With his three-set (7–5, 6–2, 6–4) victory over American Michael Chang in the final of the 1995 French Open, Muster extended his clay court winning streak to 35 matches. He would carry that string to 40, which at the time was the third longest streak in the Open era, behind Björn Borg (44) and Guillermo Vilas (53). Success in the French Open resulted in Muster being ranked third in the world, which was where he would finish the season after winning a record 12 ATP titles, the last one coming at the Eurocard Open in Essen, Germany, his first-ever win indoors. His success on clay continued into the 1996 season, and Muster was ranked the top player in the world for a period of six weeks between February and April of that year. A hip injury that October reduced his playing time over the following seasons, but he still managed a top 10 finish in 1997. Muster retired in 1999, though he later occasionally competed on the seniors tour. In 2010, however, he briefly returned to the ATP Tour before retiring again the following year.