Elena Sergeyevna Vesnina (born 1 August 1986) is a Russian former professional tennis player who was world No. 1 in doubles. Vesnina is a four-time Grand Slam champion, having won the 2013 French Open, 2014 US Open, and 2017 Wimbledon Championships in women's doubles with compatriot Ekaterina Makarova, and the 2016 Australian Open in mixed doubles, partnering Bruno Soares. She reached also eight further finals in women's doubles, and four in mixed doubles.
She became world No. 1 for the first time in June 2018, alongside Makarova, with the pair jointly holding the top ranking for the next five weeks. Vesnina won 19 doubles titles on WTA Tour, including the 2016 WTA Finals and eight at WTA 1000-level.
She also achieved significant success in singles, reaching her career-high ranking of world No. 13 in March 2017. Vesnina won three WTA singles titles, including the 2017 Indian Wells Open, and achieved her best Grand Slam result at the 2016 Wimbledon Championships, reaching the semifinals.
She has represented Russia in the Billie Jean King Cup since 2006, winning the competition in 2007 and 2008, and competed at the Olympic Games on four occasions. Makarova and Vesnina won the gold medal at the 2016 Rio Olympics, and Vesnina also won mixed-doubles silver with Aslan Karatsev at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
Personal life Vesnina was born to Sergey and teacher Irina. Her grandfather is of Greek descent. She has a younger brother, Dmitry, a former junior tennis player. She started playing tennis aged seven in the sports school in Sochi.
In November 2015, Vesnina married businessman Pavel Tabuntsov. They have two daughters. Their first daughter, Elizaveta, was born on 19 November 2018. Their second daughter Anna was born in 2023.
Career 2002–2003 In October 2002, aged 16 years and two months, Vesnina gained direct entry into the qualifying draw for her first $10k tournament at Giza, Egypt and qualified for the main draw before losing a three-set match. The next week, again qualifying at Al-Mansoura to enter the main draw, where she won two further matches, beating Hana Šromová of the Czech Republic in the second round, to reach her first $10k quarterfinal in her second event played. However, she defaulted her quarterfinal tie to her opponent.
In 2003, Vesnina began the year entering two successive ITF Circuit events in India, at Chennai and Bangalore, and qualified both times, but also reached her first semifinal and another quarterfinal in the main draws, losing to Akgul Amanmuradova at the quarterfinal stage at Bangalore. These results gave Vesnina her first ranking at world No. 750, enough to gain direct entry to her next $10k draw at Istanbul, where she beat her personal best result in reaching the final. The following week, at Antalya, she was knocked out in the first round by her then-compatriot Evgenia Linetskaya; and in May she met with mixed results in Lviv, Ukraine and Warsaw, Poland; but in June, she won the $10k event at Balashikha.
After taking her career-first ITF title, Vesnina competed in Bucharest losing to Raluca Sandu in the second round. She stayed there to compete at Bucharest, where she made it through the finals losing to German Antonela Voina in two sets. She then competed in Zhukovsky, Russia as a qualifier and succeeded, then won through all the way to the semifinal of the main draw with a tight three-set quarterfinal victory over compatriot Ekaterina Bychkova en route, but was stopped in the semifinals by Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine.
In the middle of September, Vesnina qualified for her second straight $25k tournament at Tbilisi, Georgia, and this time won the title, recording victories over Evgenia Linetskaya, Olga Barabanschikova, and Mariya Koryttseva, in the quarterfinal, semifinal and final respectively. She then failed to qualify, trying to get to for first main-draw appearance at the WTA Tour in her next two events in Moscow and Tashkent. She finished the year ranked No. 279.
2004–2005 Vesnina began the year with a second-round exit at the ITF event in Bergamo. She then failed to qualify for the ITF Ortisei, exiting at the first round of the qualifying draw. She also lost in first qualifying round of the 2004 Hyderabad Open to an unranked Barbara Schwartz. At St. Petersburg, she got past the qualifying round and then defeated compatriot Anastasia Rodionova in the first round proper on her way to a quarterfinal finish, where she was defeated by Ivana Lisjak of Croatia.
Vesnina next played in June at Marseille, falling at the last round of the qualifying draw she was granted a lucky loser before bowing out to No. 1 seed and then world No. 70, Ľubomíra Kurhajcová. She then made early exits in Gorizia and Vittel. Following this, she reached two ITF quarterfinals in a row, in Moscow losing to Maria Kondratieva, and in Balashikha losing to Anastasiya Yakimova. In late September, as a direct main-draw entrant into the $50k tournament at Batumi, Georgia, she also reached the quarterfinals, where she lost to No. 1 seed Anna Chakvetadze.
In her next events, Vesnina tried to qualify for a WTA Tour-level Kremlin Cup but was knocked out at the second hurdle by world No. 61, Claudine Schaul, and in the Bell Challenge where she succeeded for the first time in winning through qualifying into a WTA tournament main draw but lost in the first round of the main draw to Mariana Díaz Oliva. Vesnina then qualified in Opole, Poland, but lost to Hana Šromová in the second-round. She ended the year by reaching the quarterfinal at Bergamo, losing to Estonian star Maret Ani. Vesnina ended the year ranked No. 286.
She started 2005 attempting to make headway in WTA Tour main draws and next entered the qualifying round of the Cellular South Cup but lost in straight sets to Varvara Lepchenko. The following week, she lost to Tatsiana Uvarova in the second qualifying round of an ITF tournament at St. Paul, Minnesota. Extending her bad start, she made a first-round exit at the ITF St. Petersburg; she then qualified at Civitavecchia, reaching the semifinals before losing to Maret Ani in three sets. In May, she entered qualifying for the Tier II event at Warsaw, and avenged her previous defeat by Adriana Barna, knocking her out but then fell again to Anna Chakvetadze in the second round.
A couple of weeks later, Vesnina suffered a disappointing first-round loss to Olivia Sanchez of France in the first round of a $25k event at Antalya. The following week, she qualified for her second career WTA Tour main draw at the İstanbul Cup losing to Mashona Washington, in the second round after her first WTA Tour match win. Returning in June, she reached the final of an event at Galatina, Italy, defeating higher-ranked Tatiana Poutchek on the way, before losing the title to Mariya Koryttseva. At her next two ITF tournaments in early July, she failed to qualify in Fano while losing to similarly ranked compatriot Lioudmila Skavronskaia in the first round in Cuneo, Italy. But later that month, she qualified for her third career WTA Tour main draw at Modena, in the first round she cruised past a low-ranked special entrant from Maja Matevžič before being ousted by world No. 28, Flavia Pennetta, in second round.
The very next week, Vesnina won through qualifying into a WTA main draw for the fourth time at Palermo but lost Maret Ani in the first round. In her next three events, she failed to qualify for the main draw of the WTA events at the Nordic Light Open losing to Emma Laine in the third round of the qualifying draw, in the Rogers Cup where she first beat Swiss perennial and world No. 110, Emmanuelle Gagliardi, but then was ousted by world No. 93, Rika Fujiwara, and in the US Open to Marina Erakovic in the second round of the qualifying draw. She then reached the semifinals in Denain, France, losing to Arantxa Parra Santonja, and in Bordeaux losing to Stéphanie Foretz. Vesnina attained direct entry to a main draw for the first time in her career in October at the Tashkent Open, where she reached her first quarterfinal losing to Akgul Amanmuradova. She then failed to qualify at the Kremlin Cup losing to Alona Bondarenko. In the Generali Ladies Linz, she came through the qualifying round before losing to Tamira Paszek.
In November at the Bell Challenge, Vesnina reached her second quarterfinal losing to 75th-ranked Sofia Arvidsson. In the next two weeks, she came unstuck in early rounds of ITF events, losing to Emma Laine in the first round at Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and to Kaia Kanepi in the second round at Deauville, France. She ended the year with a semifinal appearance at Poitiers in the final week of November and her last tournament, losing to Viktoriya Kutuzova (en route she beat Marion Bartoli and world No. 96, Stéphanie Foretz). She ended the year ranked No. 111.
2006 Beginning the new season at the Brisbane International, Vesnina was defeated by Puerto Rican world No. 157, Vilmarie Castellvi, in the first round of the qualifying draw for the Tier III event at Gold Coast, and then she was beaten by Nuria Llagostera Vives in the first round of the Hobart International the following week.
Being ranked No. 100, she was awarded direct entry into her first ever Grand Slam tournament at the Australian Open, and reached the fourth round with defeats of qualifiers Li Ting, Julia Schruff and Olga Savchuk before losing to world No. 7, Nadia Petrova. She next competed at the Bangalore Open and Indian Wells Open but lost in the first rounds of both contests, losing to Australian world No. 127, Nicole Pratt, at Bangalore and to world No. 86, Viktoriya Kutuzova, at Indian Wells. However, she reached the third round at Miami and Amelia Island losing to Tatiana Golovin and Virginia Ruano Pascual, respectively.
The week after, playing at Family Circle Cup, Vesnina again came out the loser this time against fellow-Russian Vera Zvonareva. In May, retreating to a lower-level Tier-IV event at Estoril, Portugal, she encountered Flavia Pennetta, the first seed in the draw, in the first round; and this time the Italian wrought her revenge. At the Berlin Open, she lost to Czech Květa Peschke in the first round.
At the Internationaux de Strasbourg, Vesnina encountered fierce resistance in the first round from upcoming Italian world No. 249, Karin Knapp, but finally defeated her to book her place in the second round, where she beat world No. 27, Marion Bartoli, for the second time in her career. In the quarterfinals, clay-court expert and world No. 28, Anabel Medina Garrigues, had the better of their joust, taking it. At the French Open, she lost to Peng Shuai in the first round.
Vesnina entered the grass-court circuit in Birmingham and 's-Hertogenbosch, and both reaching the second round losing to world No. 39, Mara Santangelo, and world No. 8, Elena Dementieva, respectively. In July, entering Wimbledon Championships ranked No. 63, she recovered from a set down to fend off world No. 75, María Sánchez Lorenzo, in the first round, and then second round she lost compatriot Anna Chakvetadze.
At the Carlsbad Open and LA Tennis Championships, Vesnina reached the second round of both events, losing to Emma Laine and Meghann Shaughnessy, respectively. At the qualifying round of the Rogers Cup, she was upset by Neha Uberoi of the United States in the first round. The following week at Forest Hills Classic, she lost to Shaughnessy at the quarterfinal stage. In September, in her first appearance at the US Open, she lost to world No. 14, Mary Pierce, in the first round.