Fernando González

Olympic medal record
Men's Tennis

Fernando González
Country (sports)	Chile
Residence	La Reina, Chile
Height	6 ft (183 cm)
Turned pro	1999
Plays	Right; One-handed backhand
Prize money	$5,628,520
Singles
Career record	254 - 139
Career titles	7
Highest ranking	No. 5 (January 29 2007)
Grand Slam singles results
Australian Open	F (2007)
French Open	QF (2003)
Wimbledon	QF (2005)
US Open	QF (2002)
Doubles
Career record	83 - 68
Career titles	3
Highest ranking	No. 25 (4 July 2005)
	Last updated on: May 29 2007.

Fernando Francisco González Ciuffardi (born July 29, 1980), nicknamed El bombardero de La Reina (Spanish "The La Reina Bomber"), is a professional tennis player from Chile. He is known for having one of the hardest hitting forehands in the circuit. One of his other nicknames is Mano de Piedra ("Stone Hand").

Throughout his career, González has defeated many former number-one players, including Lleyton Hewitt, Andre Agassi (both while they held the top spot), Andy Roddick, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Carlos Moya, Gustavo Kuerten, Marat Safin and Pete Sampras.

Tennis career

Early years

González began playing tennis at the age of seven. He moved with his family to the municipality of La Reina in eastern Santiago, where he practiced with his coach Claudio González (no relation) at the Club de Leones de La Reina.

As a junior, González achieved the world number one ranking. He won the US Open boys doubles (with compatriot Nicolás Massú) in 1997, and the French Open singles (defeating a young Juan Carlos Ferrero in the final) and doubles (with Venezuelan José de Armas) in 1998. That year, aged 17, he made his Davis Cup debut in Chile's tie against Argentina, losing in four sets to Franco Squillari. He won his first Davis Cup tie in a doubles rubber partnering Massú.

González achieved success at futures level in 1998. In the three futures events held in Chile that year, he reached two semifinals and defeated Italian Enzo Artoni in the final in Santiago.

1999

González became a professional in 1999. In the early stages of the year he played mainly at futures level. He reached his first challenger quarter-final in Edinburgh. He played his first ATP tournament in Washington, defeating Ivan Ljubičić in the first round before losing to Marc Rosset.

2000

González won his first ATP title in May when he defeated Massú at the U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships final in Orlando, Florida. It was the first all-Chilean ATP final since Jaime Fillol defeated Ricardo Acuña in the 1982 Itaparica final.

2002

In February González won his second career ATP title in Viña del Mar by defeating Nicolás Lapentti in the final, and later that year he won his third title in Palermo, Italy and reached the semifinals at the Cincinnati Masters (defeating seeded Tim Henman and Andy Roddick en route), and the quarterfinals at the US Open. In September he surpassed former number one player Marcelo Ríos as the top Chilean in the singles rankings, and was one of the most improved players on the ATP circuit, jumping 118 positions in the ATP Champions Race.

2004

In February, González repeated his Viña del Mar title by defeating Gustavo Kuerten in the final. In August, at the Olympic Games in Athens, he and doubles partner Massú gave their country its first ever Olympic gold medal, when they defeated Nicolas Kiefer and Rainer Schüttler of Germany to win the men's doubles tournament. He also won a bronze medal in the men's singles.

2005

González began the season by taking the title in Auckland, New Zealand —his first hard court title— in January. In April he won his first ATP doubles tournament (and second after the Olympics), in Valencia (clay) with doubles partner Martín Rodríguez. After reaching the quarterfinals at Wimbledon in June, he went on to win the ATP tournament in Amersfoort (clay), The Netherlands in the following month. He further proved his all-court versatility by winning the indoors-carpet singles title at Basel as well as winning the doubles title in the same tournament with partner Agustín Calleri. Like in 2002, the results for 2005 were enough for him to attend the year-end Masters Cup in Shanghai, first as a reserve and then as a player due to the withdrawal of Andre Agassi after his first match. González became the first Chilean to win a Masters match when he beat Mariano Puerta and just missed out on making the semifinal—and finishing the year as number 10—after losing to Gastón Gaudio in a match in which he had three match points.

2006

In April González became the third Chilean (after Ríos and Massú) to break into the top ten rankings in singles. He reached number 10 in the world after winning a quarterfinal match at the Monte Carlo Masters—shortly after breaking up with longtime coach Horacio de la Peña, who was then replaced by Larry Stefanki in May. After reaching his first Masters Series singles final in Madrid (losing to Roger Federer in straight sets) in October, he ascended to world number seven. He finished the year at number ten.

2007

In January González reached the Australian Open singles final, thereby becoming the first Chilean to have reached the quarterfinal round in all four Grand Slam tournaments, and the fourth Chilean (third male) to have reached a Grand Slam tournament final. He beat —in succession— Lleyton Hewitt, James Blake, world number two Rafael Nadal, and Tommy Haas en route to the final, which he lost to world number one Roger Federer in (relatively close) straight sets. On January 29 he jumped to number five, his best career singles ranking, and only five points behind number four. In May he became the first Chilean to reach the finals of the Rome Masters since Ríos won the title in 1998.

Playing style

González plays as an aggressive baseliner. His groundstrokes, especially on the forehand side, are extremely powerful, even amongst his contemporaries. His speed and agility allow him to hit winners from practically anywhere in the court. However, as aggressive baseliners are, he used to be prone to make a huge number of unforced errors and was less consistent. His new coach, Larry Stefanki, has helped him develop an extreme slice backhand which combined with his aggressive forehand has propelled his retrieving abilities to a new level and has given him much more consistency, resulting in less unforced errors. In addition, he can also approach the net by chipping and charging and has a wide array of passing shots including slice backhand passing shot, rarely used in modern tennis.

González's serve has also changed since he started working with Stefanki. His first serve used to be only a flat serve, but since late-2006 he has increasingly used a three-quarter of strength slice serve to move his opponents out of the court and increase his precision. The addition of an extreme slice backhand and a slice serve have made him a markedly better player as he has a wider array of choices to get him out of jams or move his opponents to set up his powerful forehand.

Personal life

González was born in Santiago, Chile. His father, Fernando González, is the manager of a flour mill in Santiago and his mother, Patricia Ciuffardi, a housewife.

González is currently dating Argentine tennis player Gisela Dulko.

Grand Slam finals

Singles runners-up

Year	Tournament	Opponent in final	Score in final
2007	Australian Open	Roger Federer	6-7², 4-6, 4-6

ATP Masters Series finals

Singles runners-up

Year	Tournament	Opponent in final	Score in final
2006	Madrid	Roger Federer	5-7, 1-6, 0-6
2007	Rome	Rafael Nadal	2-6, 2-6

All finals

Singles wins

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent in the final	Score
1.	May 7 2000	Orlando, Florida, U.S.	Clay	Nicolás Massú	6-2, 6-3
2.	February 17 2002	Viña del Mar, Chile	Clay	Nicolás Lapentti	6-3, 6-7⁵, 7-6⁴
3.	September 29 2002	Palermo, Italy	Clay	José Acasuso	5-7, 6-3, 6-1
4.	February 15 2004	Viña del Mar, Chile	Clay	Gustavo Kuerten	7-5, 6-4
5.	January 16 2005	Auckland, New Zealand	Hard	Olivier Rochus	6-4, 6-2
6.	July 24 2005	Amersfoort, Netherlands	Clay	Agustín Calleri	7-5, 6-3
7.	October 30 2005	Basel, Switzerland	Carpet (i)	Marcos Baghdatis	6-7¹⁰, 6-3, 7-5, 6-4

Singles runners-up

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent in the final	Score
1.	October 27 2002	Basel, Switzerland	Carpet (i)	David Nalbandian	4-6, 3-6, 2-6
2.	August 3 2003	Washington, DC, U.S.	Hard	Tim Henman	3-6, 4-6
3.	October 5 2003	Metz, France	Hard (i)	Arnaud Clément	3-6, 6-1, 3-6
4.	July 18 2004	Amersfoort, Netherlands	Clay	Martin Verkerk	6-7⁵, 6-4, 4-6
5.	February 6 2005	Viña del Mar, Chile	Clay	Gastón Gaudio	3-6, 4-6
6.	October 15 2006	Vienna, Austria	Hard (i)	Ivan Ljubičić	3-6, 4-6, 5-7
7.	October 22 2006	Madrid, Spain	Hard (i)	Roger Federer	5-7, 1-6, 0-6
8.	October 29 2006	Basel, Switzerland	Carpet (i)	Roger Federer	3-6, 2-6, 6-7³
9.	January 28 2007	Australian Open	Hard	Roger Federer	6-7², 4-6, 4-6
10.	May 13 2007	Rome, Italy	Clay	Rafael Nadal	2-6, 2-6

Doubles wins

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partnering	Opponents in the final	Score
1.	August 21 2004	Athens Olympics	Hard	Nicolás Massú	Nicolas Kiefer Rainer Schüttler	6-2, 4-6, 3-6, 7-6(7), 6-4
2.	April 10 2005	Valencia, Spain	Clay	Martín Rodríguez	Lucas Arnold Ker Mariano Hood	6-4, 6-4
3.	October 30 2005	Basel, Switzerland	Carpet (i)	Agustín Calleri	Stephen Huss Wesley Moodie	7-5, 7-5

Doubles runners-up

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Partnering	Opponents in the final	Score
1.	July 24 2005	Amersfoort, Netherlands	Clay	Nicolás Massú	Martín García Luis Horna	4-6, 4-6

Team competition wins

2003 - World Team Championship, Düsseldorf, Germany (Clay)
2004 - World Team Championship, Düsseldorf, Germany (Clay)

Other wins

No.	Date	Tournament	Surface	Opponent in the final	Score	Notes
1.	August 21 2004	Athens Olympics	Hard	Taylor Dent	6-4, 2-6, 16-14	Bronze medal match

Singles performance timeline

Tournament	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	Career win-loss
Australian Open	A	1R	4R	2R	1R	3R	1R	F	12-7
French Open	A	2R	3R	QF	1R	3R	2R	1R	10-7
Wimbledon	A	A	2R	1R	3R	QF	3R		10-5
U.S. Open	2R	A	QF	3R	1R	3R	3R		12-6
Grand Slam Win-Loss¹	1-1	1-2	10-4	6-4	2-4	10-4	5-4	6-2	41-25
Indian Wells Masters	A	A	2R	1R	3R	4R	2R	4R	6-6
Miami Masters	A	A	4R	2R	SF	3R	3R	3R	10-6
Monte Carlo Masters	A	A	1R	1R	1R	3R	SF	2R	6-6
Rome Masters	A	A	3R	A	2R	1R	QF	F	11-5
Hamburg Masters	A	A	2R	QF	3R	2R	3R	QF	11-6
Canada Masters	A	A	1R	1R	3R	1R	SF		6-5
Cincinnati Masters	A	A	SF	2R	2R	3R	SF		12-5
Madrid Masters (Stuttgart)	A	A	2R	1R	2R	QF	F		7-5
Paris Masters	A	A	1R	1R	2R	2R	2R		0-5
Tennis Masters Cup	A	A	A	A	A	RR	A		1-1
Total Titles	1	0	2	0	1	3	0	0	7
Year End Ranking	115	139	18	35	23	11	10		N/A

A = did not participate in the tournament.
1. The win total does not include walkovers.

External links

Template:Top ten South American male tennis players