Vavara Gracheva is a Russian-born French professional tennis player who was born on August 2, 2000, in Moscow, Russia. She was quickly whisked into the tennis system by her mother, Natalia, who coached her right up until the age of 14. At that age, she was ready to move abroad in search of better facilities.
This search initially took her to Germany before settling in the South of France. After good foundations were formed during her junior career, the youngster started off playing her first professional events in 2017.
Once she saw that she could qualify for the odd professional-level event, she juggled this with ITF tournaments until 2019. 2019 was the year when she made her official main draw WTA debut, with her ranking having grown enough to qualify her for the Lausanne Open. Despite losing in the first round against Han Xinyu, it was a positive week, having come through some grueling qualifying matches.
This was not to dampen spirits for the spritely then-Russian player, who went on to perform at a handful of other WTA events. However, 2020 was the year when things really picked up for her. Despite a COVID-19-hit season, she made her Grand Slam debut at the US Open, upsetting household name Paula Badosa in straight sets.
Next up was Kristina Mladenovic, who she came back from 1-6, 1-5 down against to make the third round. At a postponed French Open, she came up against Elina Svitolina in the first round but fell at the first hurdle.
Despite not starting 2021 in the way she would have hoped, she did continue to make strides on tour. She made the third round at the French Open before going on to make her first WTA semifinal appearance at the Chicago Open, eventually losing to Alize Cornet.
Fast-forward to 2023, and her progress continued on the upward spiral. Starting off strong Down Under to reach the third round of the season-opening Grand Slam, the Australian Open, she went on to get to her first WTA final at the ATX Open in Austin, Texas, United States, where she eventually lost to eight-seed Marta Kostyuk.
This stellar season set her up nicely to break into the world's Top 40 at the start of 2024, which she is hoping to build on in her search for that first WTA trophy.
