Yayuk Basuki

At 53 years old, Yayuk Basuki has this physical status:

She began playing tennis at the age of seven and turned professional in 1990. In 1991, she became the first Indonesian player to win a major professional tennis event when she captured the singles titles at Pattaya. She won six WTA Tour singles titles during her career (all of them in Asia). Her best singles performance at a Grand Slam event came at Wimbledon in 1997, where she reached the quarterfinals by defeating Ai Sugiyama, Inés Gorrochategui, Naoko Kijimuta and Patricia Hy-Boulais before losing to Jana Novotná.

During her career, she has recorded wins over Amélie Mauresmo, Mary Joe Fernández, Lindsay Davenport, Gabriela Sabatini, Magdalena Maleeva, Anke Huber, Iva Majoli, Anna Kournikova, Zina Garrison, and Mary Pierce. Probably her greatest triumph was over Iva Majoli when the Croatian was the French Open champion. She also became only the second Indonesian woman to win the Asian Games singles gold medal, after Lita Liem Sugiarto in 1974, when she defeated Tamarine Tanasugarn in Bangkok at the 1998 games. She was the first player to be beaten by Lindsay Davenport in the main draw of a Grand Slam tournament, at the US Open in 1992.

She represented Indonesia at the Summer Olympic Games in 1988, 1992, 1996 and 2000. 1992 in Barcelona, she defeated Mercedes Paz and Mary Pierce to reach the third round of the singles competition, where she was beaten by Jennifer Capriati.

She is also a successful doubles player, often pairing with Nana Miyagi and later Caroline Vis, and reached the top 10 (No. 9 on 6 July 1998). She won nine tour doubles titles, the most significant of which was the Canadian Open in 1997 and qualified for the season-ending WTA Championships as one of the best eight teams of the year three times, 1996–98. Her best result in doubles competition at a Grand Slam event was in the 1993 US Open, where she and partner Nana Miyagi reached the semifinals.

In the mixed doubles, Basuki reached the quarterfinals at the French Open in 1995 with Kenny Thorne as her partner. In 1997, she reached the same stage at Wimbledon, this time paired with Tom Nijssen.

Her career-high world rankings were world No. 19 in singles and No. 9 in doubles.

Basuki is now a coach, tennis commentator for TV and print media and a consultant to the sports minister. She also was a WTA Tour mentor to rising Indonesian star Angelique Widjaja.

Basuki retired from the professional circuit in 2004, but in March 2008 she made a return to the ITF Circuit playing exclusively in doubles, and has since won six more ITF titles. She won the $10k event at Bangkok in June with Indonesian-born Australian Tiffany Welford. In August, she won the Hechingen, Germany with compatriot Romana Tedjakusuma and yet another $25k title, this time in Augusta, Georgia, in October, again with Tedjakusuma. In the first tournament she played in 2009, the $25k Balikpapan event in Indonesia, she and Tedjakusuma won the doubles competition. In May 2009, she won consecutive $25k events in Goyang and then Gimhae, both in the Korean Republic, and again, both with Tedjakusuma.

Basuki played in the doubles at the 2010 Australian Open, partnering Kimiko Date-Krumm, losing in the first round to Sania Mirza and Virginia Ruano Pascual.

In 2011, Basuki played in three WTA and five ITF tournaments. She successfully represented Indonesia in the Fed Cup, winning four matches with partner Jessy Rompies to see Indonesia back into the Asia/Oceania Group I. Her most recent appearance in a WTA Tour event was in September 2011 at the Guangzhou International Open, in which she and partner Lu Jingjing reached the quarterfinals.

As of December 2012, her most recent appearance in a professional tournament was in the $25k event in Phuket in March 2012. She and partner Kao Shao-yuan reached the quarterfinals of the doubles competition. In 2013, she retired from the tour to pursue a career as a politician.

Political career

In the 2014 Indonesian parliamentary election, she stood for a seat in the DPR with the National Mandate Party (PAN) from Central Java I electoral district. She was elected and sat on Commission X focusing on education, sports, and history. In the 2019 election, Basuki again ran as a legislative candidate in the same electoral district. However, the party did not win enough votes and therefore she lost her seat in the parliament.

Source

• WTA Sportsmanship Award, 1996 and 1998
• Female Rookie of the Year 1991, TENNIS Magazine
• Indonesian Athlete of the Year 1991
• Nominated as Most Impressive Newcomer 1991, WTA Tour
• Special Award from President Soeharto of Indonesia for outstanding contribution to sports, 1991