On this day: Marat Safin completes mid-2000 turnaround, dramatic rise to No. 1 | ATP Tour
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On this day: Safin turns a profit in mid-2000 and rises significantly to #1
Mercurial star wins seven titles in eight months to reach top spot for first time
November 20, 2025
Patrick Herzog/AFP via Getty Images
Marat Safin had a stellar performance at the 2000 Rolex Paris Masters, lifting the trophy and becoming world number one.
Andy West
If Marat Safin’s career has often been defined by fleeting moments of genius, the 2000 ATP Tour season was the moment when everything remained consistent for the powerful right-hander.
From April to November of that year, Safin won seven of his 15 career tour-level titles. Such prolonged success was somewhat unexpected for a 20-year-old who was just entering his third full season on tour, but Safin’s form has been so good that on November 20 he became the 18th No. 1 in the history of the PIF ATP Rankings.
At the start of 2000, Safin lost 11 of his first 16 games before entering the Barcelona Open ranked 35th in the world. Six wins later, he won his second ATP Tour title, defeating top ten stars Nicolas Lapenti and Magnus Norman and home favorite Juan Carlos Ferrero in the championship match.
Safin breaks into the top 20 for the first time since winning in Catalonia. Perhaps more importantly, the success also seemed to change his mind. He added another clay-court trophy to his collection in Mallorca a week later, then reached his second ATP Masters 1000 final in Hamburg before lifting his first trophy at this level in Toronto in early August.
In New York in September, Safin defeated Pete Sampras in straight sets with a stunning performance to win his first Grand Slam title at the U.S. Open. Hard-court titles in Tashkent and St. Petersburg, and another Masters 1000 crown on the indoor carpet in Paris, completed his 2000 championship run. Starting with Barcelona in April, Safin went on to a 68-16 record the rest of the year.
After rising to second place after the US Open, victory in Paris laid the foundation for Safin to compete for the top spot. At 20 years and 10 months, he was the youngest player to top the PIF ATP Rankings at the time, although this record was soon surpassed by Lleyton Hewitt (2001) and later Carlos Alcaraz (2022).
Entering the late-season Nitto ATP Finals (then the Tennis Masters Cup), Safin needed to win three matches to secure himself as the year-end ATP No. 1 by the PIF, but lost to Sampras in the group stage and Agassi in the semifinals, allowing Gustavo Kuerten to beat him to the honor. Despite the disappointing ending, Safin’s charge to No. 1 remains one of the most remarkable mid-season turns in ATP history, one that Safin later admitted surprised even himself.
“For me, the experience of reaching No. 1 and being No. 1 was very strange,” Safin told ATPTour.com. Safin returned to the top spot twice in 2001, staying there for a total of nine weeks. “I wasn’t ready because just a few months ago I couldn’t imagine that I had a chance to be No. 1. I was in the top 50 and kept falling and playing really badly. I underestimated myself… I didn’t believe in myself and I found myself weaker than everyone else, which was unbelievable.”
