Five things to know about Tallon Griekspoor

Tallon Griekspoor will try to earn the biggest win of his career on Sunday evening when he faces second seed Carlos Alcaraz for a spot in the China Open quarter-finals.

ATPTour.com looks at five things to know about the No. 39 player in the PIF ATP Rankings before his big match in Beijing.

Tallon reached a career-high World No. 21 in November 2023
Griekspoor is currently the No. 1 Dutch player in the PIF ATP Rankings. Before 2021 he had never cracked the Top 100. He started his 2023 season at No. 95. Winning his maiden tour-level title at the ATP 250 event in Pune in January 2023, the Dutchman boosted his ranking early on in the season.

A third-round appearance at the Australian Open and semi-final run at the ATP 500 event in Rotterdam saw him steadily propel through the rankings. With another tour-level title at the ATP 250 event in 's-Hertogenbosch in front of his home crowd and a final run at the ATP 500 event in Washington, Griekspoor kept improving.

Showing consistency on the Tour throughout last season, including notable wins over Alexander Zverev and Hubert Hurkacz, he reached a career-high No. 21 in November 2023.

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He made ATP Challenger Tour history
Griekspoor holds the ATP Challenger Tour record for most titles in a season, winning eight trophies in 2021. Nobody else has claimed more than six titles in a season (Benjamin Bonzi, Sebastian Baez, Facundo Bagnis, Juan Ignacio Chela, Younes El Aynaoui).

During the 2021 season, Griekspoor started his ATP Challenger Tour title run by winning in Prague in May, followed by wins in Bratislava and Amersfoort.

He then won five titles in a row, starting in Murcia, triumphing twice in Napoli, Tenerife, and the last one of the season in Bratislava again. He finished the season with an impressive 8-0 record in the Challenger finals.

He also holds the record longest winning streak at the Challenger level in a single season with 25 wins in the same season.

The Dutchman is yet to win a match against Alcaraz
Griekspoor trails the Spaniard 0-3 in the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head series.

He has never taken a set off the four-time major champion. All the losses have come on big stages and three different surfaces, at 2022 Wimbledon, the 2023 BNP Paribas Open and the 2024 Paris Olympics.

“Wasn’t my best match, I lost in three. I thought that on grass, if you want to beat the guy at some surface, it would have been grass in my eyes. But he played well there, I didn’t play too great,” Griekspoor said ahead of their 2023 Indian wells match. “He’s one of the best players in the world, that’s for sure. He’s so young. He’s injured, he comes back straight away, he plays so well. So it’s going to be really tough, but at the end I really like the challenge of playing him. Why not?”

Photo credit: Matthew Stockman/Getty Images
Tennis runs in the family
Born in Haarlem, Netherlands, Griekspoor started playing tennis at the age of six. His older twin brothers Scott Griekspoor and Kevin Griekspoor are former players. As a kid, he used to join the two during their lessons. Scott climbed to a career-high ranking of No. 205 and Kevin reached World No. 655.

In 2018, both Tallon and Scott won Challenger titles.

“I always had two guys to look up to, six years older," Griekspoor said. "They were much better and stronger than me at that time, so I really enjoyed that.”

His mother Monique is also a tennis instructor.

Family’s racing history
Griekspoor’s father Ron is a former motocross driver.

“I didn’t do [motocross] that much myself. I did it for fun. The other side of my family, my nephews, they’re doing it professionally. In the family it’s tennis and motocross,” Griekspoor said. “Almost every weekend when it’s on, I’m watching it. It’s just part of my youth. I grew up with it and I really, really like it.”

The 28-year-old is also a big Formula One fan and enjoys watching fellow Dutchman Max Verstappen.

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