Her celebrity status made her one of the best known tennis players worldwide. At the peak of her fame, fans looking for images of Kournikova made her name (or misspellings of it) one of the most common search strings on the internet search engine Google.
Although also successful in singles, reaching #8 in the world in 2000, Kournikova's specialty has been doubles, where she has at times been the world's number one-ranked player. With Martina Hingis as her partner, she won Grand Slam titles in Australia in 1999 and 2002. Kournikova's major-league tennis career has been curtailed for the past several years, and possibly ended, by serious back and spinal problems.
