A never-ending story

Roland Garros - Way back!

The stadium that stages one of the world's four major tennis tournaments was built in 1928, but the French men's singles championship goes back much further than that. Originally reserved for members of French clubs, it was first held on the courts of Stade Français club in Paris in 1891. The women's singles were added six years later, it was not until 1925 that the French Tennis Federation decided to open the event to the best foreign tennis players. Thus, the French Internationals were born, and staged alternately at Stade Français and Racing Club de France until the Roland-Garros stadium came into being in 1928.


These Musketeers need a stadium!
1927 was a milestone for French tennis, the year the celebrated French Musketeers (Jacques "Toto" Brugnon, Jean Borotra, Henri Cochet and René Lacoste) pulled off one of the biggest shocks in 20th century sport. The famous foursome upset all the odds by winning the Davis Cup on American soil, and in doing so set up a rematch in 1928, in Paris. Obviously, such a major sporting occasion required a stadium worthy of its stature, and so it was that the Stade Français handed over three hectares of land near Porte d'Auteuil to the French Tennis Federation. The only condition to the offer of land was that the new stadium should bear the name of one of Stade Français' most renowned former members, Roland-Garros, who had died some ten years earlier. Roland-Garros was an aviation pioneer who, on 23 September 1913, had become the first man to fly a plane over the Mediterranean.

The 1928 French Internationals were the first event to be held in the new stadium, just before the Musketeers took centre-stage to beat the Americans in their long-awaited rematch.

A new era began in 1968 with the French Championships becoming the first "open" Grand Slam tournament, bringing together amateurs and professionals who had previously played separately.
Today, the tournament is fully deserving of its reputation as the world's premier clay court event. It is furiously competitive each year, to such an extent that French successes have been few and far between.