How drug addiction ended Hingis career at 27

The Swiss, 41, won 25 Grand Slams – including Wimbledon – during her illustrious career.

How drug addiction ended Hingis career at 27
Martina Hingis

Former pro tennis player and multiple Grand Slam winner Martina Hingis had to retire at 27 owing to cocaine allegations - while her previous husband claimed he found her in bed with another man

The Swiss, 41, won 25 Grand Slams – including Wimbledon – during her illustrious career.

But the good days were brought to an end in 2007. At 27 years old, Hingis called a press conference to announce that she was under investigation for testing positive for benzoylecgonine, which is a metabolite of cocaine.

"I have tested positive but I have never taken drugs and I feel 100% innocent," she said. "I am frustrated and angry. I find this accusation so horrendous, so monstrous, that I have decided to confront it head-on by talking to the press."



She was tested at Wimbledon and her sample contained an estimated 42 nanograms per millilitre of benzoylecgonine. The International Tennis Federation's report found it was a low amount and she did try and appeal on the basis it was contamination, rather than her using anything illegal.

However, her appeal did not win and the following year a tribunal suspended Hingis from the sport for two years. She retired from professional tennis as a result.

The former sports star also caught the headlines after her husband found her in bed with another man. French equestrian Thibault Hutin claimed she was a serial cheater and found her laying with someone else just a year after she was married.

He said: "Martina has a very personal conception of morality. She has always been like that; I think she has always been unfaithful to her boyfriends."

Of her playing days, she told ESPN: "My weapon on the tennis court is and always was one single thing: the game, the ingenuity on court. And for this style of tennis, there is only one performance enhancer - the love of the game."