3- Hundreds Like Her: Steffi Before the Tour

Before Steffi Graf was a Grand Slam legend, she was a shy German kid smashing lamps in her parents’ living room and grinding on cold club courts. In this episode, we follow Steffi from basement practices with her dad in Mannheim and early junior heartbreak at the Sport Scheck tournament in Munich, to her brutal training days in Leimen alongside a young Boris Becker and her first pro match against Tracy Austin in Filderstadt—complete with the now-famous “hundreds like her” quote that seriously aged badly. If you love women’s tennis history, German tennis, or just want to know how a future No. 1 is built long before the WTA rankings ever notice, this deep dive into Steffi’s pre-tour years is for you.