Wheelchair tennis star Diede de Groot wins 2024 Laureus Award

Dutch wheelchair tennis player Diede de Groot won the 2024 Laureus World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability Award for a stunning year that saw her cement her position as one of the greatest tennis players of all time.

De Groot, a two-time Paralympic champion, received her first Laureus award at a ceremony in Madrid on Monday, 22 April. The Laureus World Sports celebrates the remarkable achievements by a Para athlete in 2023.

“Since I was a little girl, tennis gave me the biggest smile on my face. When I was a teenager, it gave me a different path to follow and suddenly tennis became my job. And it was only recently that wheelchair tennis gave me a different insight, that it was actually a very special journey," de Groot said at the ceremony at the iconic Palacio de Cibeles.

“It gave me the chance to improve on myself every day and inspire so many people throughout the whole world. This award is a motivator and also a reminder that with the biggest smile on my face, I can do anything and so can all the other little Diedes out there on their own journey.”

Diede de Groot became the second wheelchair tennis star – after Esther Vergeer’s success in 2008 and 2002 – to pick up the Laureus World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability Award. 

In 2023, de Groot cemented her status not only as the greatest wheelchair tennis player of all time, but as one of the greatest tennis players.

She was the first women’s wheelchair tennis player to achieve the Golden Slam in 2021, but in 2023 she became the first tennis player to win three successive calendar Grand Slams since wheelchair tennis singles competition was first played at all four majors in 2016.

She had an astonishing record in 2023. She was unbeaten in 53 singles matches and enjoyed a winning streak going back to the 2021 Australian Open. She finished 2023 by winning her sixth successive Singles Masters title and was ITF World Champion for the sixth time.

Serbian tennis player Novak Djokovic, who won the Laureus World Sportsman of the Year award for the fifth time, said, "I think she is a remarkable athlete. She is an amazing person, and she had a very inspiring speech today on stage that I was very touched by.

"She is an incredible ambassador of our sport, not just for wheelchair tennis but for tennis as a whole in general. I follow her, I support her and I'm really inspired by her."

De Groot is aiming to continue her success at the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games, which open on 28 August. She qualified for the Games after winning the women’s draw at the inaugural European Para Championships in 2023. She is aiming to defend her titles in the French capital after winning two golds at Tokyo 2020.

The Dutch athlete started playing wheelchair tennis at age 7 and fell in love with it straight away. She started playing professionally when she was 17, roughly two years before she made her Paralympic debut at Rio 2016. She earned the silver medal in the women’s doubles tournament.

This year, the other finalists of the award were swimmers Simone Baarlaam of Italy and Danylo Chufarov of Ukraine, Hungarian sprinter Luca Ekler, New Zealand’s Para cyclist Nicole Murray, and German long jumper Markus Rehm.