Prince Nelson of the United Kingdom

Nelson Bacall
KBE
Full name	Nelson Frederick Francis Albert Charles
Country (sports)	Great Britain
Born	March 23, 1962 (age 62); London, England
Height	1.82 m (6 ft 0 in)
Turned pro	1980
Retired	2005
Plays	Right-handed (two-handed backhand)
Coach	Pancho Segura
Prize money	$82,263,939; * 4th all-time leader in earnings
Int. Tennis HoF	2006
Singles
Career record	1052-158 (86.95%)
Career titles	86 (6th in the Open Era)
Highest ranking	No. 1 (9 December 1983)
Grand Slam singles results
Australian Open	W (1983, 1984, 1986, 1989, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2001)
French Open	W (1981, 1983, 1984, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2005)
Wimbledon	W (1983, 1984, 1989, 1998, 2002)
US Open	W (1983, 1984, 1988, 1990, 1992, 1993, 1997)
Tour Finals	W (1985, 1990, 1993, 1994, 1999, 2002, 2004)
WCT Finals	W (1983)
Olympic Games	W (1984, 1992, 2000, 2004)
Career record	{{#property:P555}}
Mixed doubles
Career record	36-8 (82.3%)
Career titles	14
Grand Slam mixed doubles results
Australian Open	W (1993, 1997, 1998, 1999)
French Open	W (1992, 1994, 1998, 1999)
Wimbledon	W (1991, 1995, 1999)
US Open	W (1992, 1994, 1999)
Team competitions
Davis Cup	W (2005)
Medal record
Representing Great Britain
Olympic Games

Prince Nelson (Nelson Frederick Francis Albert Charles; born 23 March 1961), known professionally as Nelson Bacall, is a British former professional tennis player, filmmaker, and a member of the British royal family. The youngest of two sons of King Charles III and the American actress Lauren Bacall, Nelson is known for his twenty-five years long career in professional tennis during which he won a total of 86 singles titles including a joint record of 7 ATP Finals titles and a record 29 Grand Slam men's singles titles. Having turned professional in 1980, in the following year, Nelson won his first title at the French Open, becoming the first British player to win a major Grand Slam title since Fred Perry. In 1983, Nelson subsequently won his first US Open, Australian Open, and Wimbledon Championships titles, as well as his second French Open title, thereby becoming the first British player to be ranked world No. 1 by the Association of Tennis Professionals and only the third man to complete a Grand Slam after Rod Laver and Don Budge. Throughout the course of his twenty-five-year career, Nelson went on to win the Australian Open a further eight times, the French Open a further six times, the US Open a further six times, and the Wimbledon Championships a further four times, during which he became the record holder for most US Open titles won alongside Bill Tilden with seven and formerly the record holder for the most Australian Open titles won with nine until he was later surpassed by Novak Djokovic in 2023. In 1984, Nelson became the first player to achieve the Golden Slam, a feat only repeated four years later by Steffi Graf, with whom he also shares the distinction of being the only two players to have won each of the four Grand Slam tournaments at least four times as well as the only three players alongside Margaret Court to have won the Grand Slam in both singles and mixed doubles categories. In addition, with a total of seven titles, together with Novak Djokovic, Nelson also holds the joint record for the most ATP Finals titles where, at forty-four years old, he is also the oldest player to have won the tournament. Moreover, in 1983, in his only WCT Finals win, Nelson famously defeated the American tennis player John McEnroe to become the only British player to win the tournament. Meanwhile, on the international stage, Nelson helped deliver gold for Great Britain in tennis for the first time in decades at the Olympic Games since 1920 and in 2005 also helped deliver Great Britain's first Davis Cup title in almost seven decades via a memorable 3-2 win over Croatia, a feat that was only repeated a decade later by Andy Murray.

In addition to his hugely successful singles career, Nelson also enjoyed much success competing in the doubles, doing so primarily with his wife Steffi Graf. Together, the duo won the Australian Open and the French Open four times as well as the Wimbledon Championships and US Open thrice during which they achieved a Grand Slam in 1999, making them only the second mixed doubles pair to win the Grand Slam after Margaret Court and Ken Fletcher. Considered widely to be the most successful and prolific mixed doubles duo of the Open Era, the two are popularly nicknamed "The Golden Pair" (German: "Das goldene Paar") by media outlets while ESPN dubbed them "The King and Queen of Tennis". Since his retirement in 2005, Nelson has served as the chairman of Great Britain's Lawn Tennis Association as well as the president of The Football Association, a post that he held until 2020 when he was succeeded by his nephew Sir William Carter. Moreover, together with his siblings, Nelson has headed the production company Regal Legacy, producing films including the Kate Joan franchise, The Golden Trail, and Don't Look Up.

Considered to be among the greatest professional tennis players in history and, among Britons, some of the nation's greatest alongside Fred Perry and Andy Murray, owing to his fast and powerful volleys and his trademark blonde hair, Nelson is popularly nicknamed "The Thunderbolt" by supporters and is considered to be the most successful student of Pancho Segura, his longtime coach and mentor. On 20 September 1999, Nelson married the former German tennis player Steffi Graf, with whom he has two children. In 2006, Nelson was inducted into the International Tennis Hall of Fame, joining the likes of fellow Britons Fred Perry, Wilfred Baddeley, Laurence Doherty, and his German wife Steffi Graf.

Early Life

Adulthood

Personal Life

As the secondborn son of King Charles III, for much of his life, Nelson was second in line to the throne of the United Kingdom. However, the birth of his niece, the future Queen Alexandra saw him relegated to third place during the final years of his father's reign. Then, during the first few years of his brother's reign, Nelson was once again second in line to the throne until the birth of his nephew Prince Richard, followed by several other children of his brother, resulted in him placing fifth in the line of succession where he currently sits.

In a somewhat unusual manner for a member of the royal family, Nelson is known to have publicly sported a pair of tattoos, both of which are inked on his arms. In this, his right arm features a tattoo depicting a lightning bolt crossed with an arrow, a reference to his nickname and playing style. Otherwise, his left arm features a tattoo depicting a combination of the letter "V" and the Roman numeral for three ("III"), a reference to the famous phrase of "Veni, vidi, vici" ("I came, I saw, I conquered") by the Roman leader Julius Caesar.

A lover of high-end automobiles in the tradition of his family, Nelson, much like his siblings, personally owns several vehicles himself in which he is known to be a devoted fan of the German luxury vehicle brand Mercedes-Benz. As of current, he normally drives a white Mercedes-AMG GT while also owning a Mercedes-Benz G-Class and a Mercedes-Benz S-Class. In addition, much like his brother, Nelson also owns a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, which he occasionally drives for leisurely purposes.

Marriage

Since 1999, Nelson has been married to the former German tennis player Steffi Graf. To that end, the couple first crossed paths at a 1990 exhibition game popularly dubbed "The Golden Slam Showdown", a best-of-three sets contest that pitted a 28-year-old Nelson and a 21-year-old Graf, both of whom currently hold the distinction of being the only two tennis players, male or female, to achieve a Golden Slam. Held at the Centre Court in Wimbledon, London, the competition initially saw Graf comfortably beat Nelson over four games straight to ultimately win the first set 6-1 in which Nelson himself only managed a single win, namely a 5-3 triumph in the fifth game. Then, in the otherwise more dramatic and tightly contested second set, the two traded wins right after the other over the course of twelve straight games to ultimately make it 6-6, during which Nelson notably fought to achieve a gruelling 13-11 victory over Graf in the tenth game, thereby resulting in an equally dramatic tiebreaker that was ultimately won by Graf 8-6, thus effectively ending the tournament with two straight sets won for the German star. In this, despite some ridicule afterwards over his heavy defeat in the first set to Graf, a newfound sense of respect and, in turn, affection for his opponent soon saw Nelson discreetly begin making a move on Graf, thus beginning their eventual romance not long after their first on-pitch encounter. However, given that both of them were established stars in tennis, the two mutually agreed to keep their relationship a secret out of a need to ensure that neither of their careers would be derailed by excessive media coverage and interest regarding their romance.

Despite the secrecy, throughout the following years, the two went on to compete together for the doubles matches to much success with the pairing itself simultaneously sparking rumours of a romance between them given their rather friendly behaviour with each other and the fact that both of them are the only ones to have ever achieved the historic Golden Slam. In this, despite neither of them publicly acknowledging their relationship, their joint appearance at the wedding of Nelson's brother to the American supermodel Christy Turlington in December 1995, coupled with them always pairing up with each other for mixed doubles matches, only gave further credence to a supposed romance between the two with the New York Post particularly coining the portmanteau "Neffi", a combination of their first names, while ESPN dubbed them "the first and greatest power couple in sports history", adding that no known romance between two highly successful athletes in any given sport has ever emerged before. Eventually, on 12 September 1999, shortly after the couple achieved a historic Grand Slam in the mixed doubles category, becoming only the second pair to do so after Margaret Court and Ken Fletcher, Nelson publicly proposed to Graf on the tennis court, a gesture that seemingly confirmed their relationship for the first time despite it reportedly being an open secret by that point. Then, on 20 September 1999, just eight days after the proposal, the couple was later wedded at Oheka Castle in New York, United States in an intimate ceremony attended by their closest friends and relatives including Graf's famous rivals Monica Seles and Martina Navratilova as well as Nelson's own brother King Thomas and his wife, the American supermodel Christy Turlington. Following this, the couple later went on to welcome two children, namely a daughter Elisabeth in 2001 and a son Carl in 2004. By the couple's own request, neither of their two children was afforded royal titles although both still retain their respective positions in the line of succession while also taking their mother's "Graf" surname.

Later on, during a 2010 interview marking the twentieth anniversary of the "Golden Slam Showdown", in one of the few instances where he publicly spoke about his marriage to Steffi Graf, Nelson, while confirming that the two did indeed begin a relationship not long after their fateful first encounter, said that he already harboured feelings for Graf before the two even met for the first time, adding that following his historic 1984 Golden Slam triumph, he initially thought that no other player, male or female, could ever replicate his success given the sheer difficulty until the German tennis legend herself did it just four years later and, being only nineteen at the time, was a few years younger than Nelson who was twenty-three at the time of his historic achievement. Consequently, Nelson himself soon conceived the idea of a "Golden Slam Showdown" between him and Graf so as to test the German tennis player himself while simultaneously working gradually towards an eventual romantic relationship, stating, "When she did what I thought no one else could do, I instantly knew that out of the many great tennis players I have met throughout my long career, she is a one-of-a-kind player that exactly no one else could compare to with all their achievements and whom I rightly saw as not just my equal in the sport but also my one-half for life".