It was a banal scene that left its mark on the world of tennis. On January 28, 1999, the young woman, just 19 years old, managed to winning against world number one Lindsay Davenport, during the semi-final of the Australian Open. But it is not not only for her victory that the champion will be talked about. Eager to share this victory with those who support it in the shadows, she immediately rushes towards the standswhere is Sylvie Bourdon, his partner at the time. Amélie Mauresmo does not think and exchange a kiss with his dearest. A harmless gesture, at least in appearance. With this sequence captured by the cameras present during the event, the tennis player has just officially revealed her homosexuality.
A gesture guided by his instinct, which was not calculatedas assured by the main interested party Paris Match in 1999. “Sylvie didn’t force me! I wanted it. I didn’t hesitate. It was a difficult step to take. I said to myself: ‘It’s going to be a mess!’. And I thought it might help some people, although I have no desire to be the spokesperson for anything. Except tolerance.” It prevents that his partner at the time still played a role in this coming out : “It’s true that I pushed a little more. All the while knowing that if she couldn’t have done it, she wouldn’t have done it. I thought it might bring her something, even if she exposed herself more than me. We did it not to stand out from the others, but to be like the others.“Amélie Mauresmo remains convinced that this revelation changed the way he played tennis. As if she was now free of a weight that had become too heavy to bear. “Ultimately, it freed me. If I’m playing well at the moment, it’s thanks to Sylvie. I stop lying, I stop hiding“, she observes to our colleagues.
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© MARTINEZ CHRISTIAN / BESTIMAGEAmélie Mauresmo and her partner at the time Sylvie Bourdon exchange a kiss publicly, at the Australian Open, in January 1999.
Amélie Mauresmo “half a man”: these hurtful comments she was subjected to
Although she stands out on the court, Amélie Mauresmo is still too often attacked on his physique. His female opponents don’t mince words, whether it’s about his figure or his game.”Sometimes, I really felt like I was playing against a boy. She hits so hard, so hard, she looks so strong, she has such shoulders, but she plays so well“, observes the American Lindsay Davenport, whom she dismissed at the end of the semi-final, according to comments reported in the newspaper 13 Heures de France 2, in 1999. The Swiss Martina Hingis is even tougher at towards Amélie Mauresmo: “I know she came here to Melbourne with her girlfriend. In fact, she’s half man“, she says, with a smile on her lips. If the Frenchwoman puts on a good face in public, these hurtful remarks do not leave her indifferent, as his trainer Christophe Fournerie suggests.
“She is surprised, not affected“, explains the one who coached her. “She is surprised that people at that level can talk like that, instead of talking about the match and what happened. It takes a little bit out of the context of the competition and no, that’s not the case. is not very important, in that it does not correspond to much“, affirms Christophe Fournerie. No offense to bad tongues, Amélie Mauresmo feels alive with Sylvie : “Before Sylvie, I experienced a lot of solitude, in boarding school sports, and moments of doubt and questioning. Without friends to confide in“, recognizes the sportswoman to Paris Match. And to note: “She helps me. She supports me. She encourages me (…) From the start, with Sylvie, I had no reservations. Before, I avoided coming face to face with my blockages. It was taboo.” From now on, Amélie Mauresmo assumes who she is.
© AGENCE / BESTIMAGEAmélie Mauresmo and Sylvie Bourdon, at Women’s Day celebrated at Matignon, in Paris, in March 1999.
Amélie Mauresmo facing a “tsunami”
While she is one of the first players to reveal her homosexuality, the coming out of Amélie Mauresmo immediately shook the world of sport. For the champion, who was only 19 years old at the time, the situation is not easy to manage. Especially since the subject was still taboo at the time. “I’m happy to have done it, that’s my opinion, my feeling, but It took me a while to digest a certain outburst and exposure I wasn’t prepared for“, she explains, in complete frankness, on the set ofWe are not in bed, in 2016.”I hesitate: tsunami, hurricane… And there were no social networks… I remember a surge that I was not prepared for at all. A mix of violence and support“, she confides, this time on the airwaves of France Inter, in 2019. “To live, it was not very pleasant. It was very very complicated“, admits the one who is now a mother of two children.
Around twenty years after the events, Amélie Mauresmo wonders about the way his coming out took place. Looking back, she says to herself that she probably could have done things differently. “It was a turbulent time, but no regrets. Maybe I would do it again in a different way (…) I would do it again, but differently…less brutally. That’s maturity and age talking. At the time, I was nineteen years old and very naive. Yes, it wasn’t easy“, she admits, facing Laurent Delahousse, in 2018.
© AGENCE / BESTIMAGEAmélie Mauresmo, during the Roland Garros tournament, in Paris, in May 2004.
A coming out of which she is “proud”
If it was necessary to cash in at the time, Amélie Mauresmoabsolutely no regrets“ for having revealed his love for women, moreover during a world-renowned tennis tournament. “The way I am perceived in the media today is obviously linked to the tsunami I experienced twenty years ago“, she assures. “After coming out in Australia, I discovered the tornado that I had unleashed, despite myself. A little naively in fact. I was 19 and it was a shock. I was absolutely not prepared for it because I had not measured the consequences“, underlines the professional athlete, in the pages of Paris Matchin 2019.
But the gesture she made that day also had an impact on the younger generation. “It was my path. It has served a lot of people. And I am proud. There is still work to be done, but things are moving in the right direction. That of tolerance“, sums up the tennis champion. Here you go how Amélie Mauresmo became, at 19, an icon who opened the way on a subject that still remains taboo in the world of sport…
Photo credits: AGENCE / BESTIMAGE
2024-01-14 07:16:00
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