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Back to the Future
Venus Williams’ 2000 Wimbledon Win Transformed Tennis
The champion, whose work exceeded her sport, urged women to demand what we deserve and own our power
This story is a part of our Back to the Future series on how key moments in the year 2000 influenced similar events in 2020.
Venus Ebony Starr Williams is a woman who has always owned her power.
Confident in her beautiful brown skin with a big game and an even bigger determination, she charted a path to historic wins while fighting systemic racism, sexism, and unequal pay one trophy at a time.
Like Venus, I began my sports career in the mid-1990s, and more than any woman I encountered, Venus did the most to make me feel like her wins were my wins. As I climbed that lonely corporate ladder in sports media, eventually going on to become one of the first Black women promoted to vice president at ESPN and a founding editor of ESPN Magazine, she was there, making me proud, lifting me up.
Like Venus, we are not satisfied with generational baby steps toward equality. We are owning our greatness and proclaiming it to the world.
Venus’ battles for respect and right to a level playing field mimicked the lives many Black women faced then and now, as we stretch for our own professional and personal successes. Like Venus, we are not satisfied with generational baby steps toward equality. We are owning our greatness and proclaiming it to the world. That self-determination was on display when 20-year-old Venus Williams walked onto the Wimbledon court, melanin popping in her custom-made backless, mid-drift baring, white mini-skirt tennis outfit. Her opponent, the formidable Lindsey Davenport.
Making her own rules for tennis fashion and form, Venus’ curly box braids were bouncing, and there was nothing but “eloquent rage” written all over her face — to borrow a phrase from Black feminist Brittney Cooper.
Her message was clear: “I came here to win this thing,” as she told reporters after beating Davenport on the grass court. “No matter what I had to do, I was…
