- Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova found a way to be great friends
- They were great rivals back in the day due to fierce competition
- Their friendship also took a hit over reports of dating the same man, Grigor Dimitrov
Retired tennis stars Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova found a way to be great friends again after years of fierce rivalry on the court.
Their relationship was further complicated by the fact that they dated Grigor Dimitrov. Dimitrov first dated Williams for a few months before she broke up with him upon the realization that he was also dating Sharapova.
Serena confirmed together with Sharapova, they had a cordial conversation when they first met in 2021. Serena had not retired at the time but she was in the process of working out her retirement which she eventually did in August 2022.
Sharapova and William happened to meet at the Moncler Genius fashion show in London, which was their first encounter since Sharapova gave birth to her son Theodore Gilkes.
Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova. Photo/Sports Illustrated
Along with other updates from her day in London, Sharapova shared a selfie she took at the fashion show with Williams in an Instagram stories post.
This came as a big surprise to tennis fans who were surprised that the two rivals buried the hatchet and moved on.
Pundits argue that there is so much that Sharapova and Williams have in common that they had to call off their differences.
First and most important is that they are now mothers, a phase that changes perception in people and they see things differently.
With their retirement, the Russian-born and American tennis players keep busy launching new projects in their tennis retirements.
They both have made large investments with the substantial sums of money they have amassed over the course of their playing careers.
Sharapova invested massively in Tonal, an AI-powered smart home gym application. With her $325 million earnings from tennis, she diversified her investment to a sizeable stake at Sugarpova, an American candy line.
The mother of one also has interests stake at Rove Furniture, Supergoop and Therabody.
For Serena Williams, her life after retirement took her focus on several firms she operated in among them, bodywear company Nude Barre, a weight-loss app Noom and Nestcoing Holding Ltd, a crypto firm.
Besides she has running partnerships with Gatorade, Nike, Gucci, Hanesbrands and Ford.
Another parallel that brings the two tennis veterans together is their lack of acknowledging the term ‘retirement’. Each of them holds some distaste for this word.
Serena Williams U.S Open defeat. Photo/Sky Sports
Williams looks at her departure from tennis as an evolution while Sharapova views it as a transition in life.
William’s evolution shifted her focus to the possibility of having more kids with her husband Alexis Ohanian. The couple have a daughter together, Olympia.
For Sharapova, raising a family is also a reason why she left tennis to make time for her husband Alexander Gilkes and they were blessed with a son in 2022.
Having earned a fortune in their heydays, they ploughed most of their earnings into investments which are also demanding their attention.
Williams, 41, is poised to reach the billion-dollar mark given the portfolio of her investments.
She has made it a goal to diversify venture capital, and her portfolio shows that she has both a keen eye and a wide net.
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