In figures: 2021 ATP Challenger Tour | ATP circuit

Bonzi Tops wins the ranking
Benjamin Bonzi was a dominant force on the ATP Challenger Tour in 2021. The Frenchman has amassed 50 tour-lead wins this year, joining the exclusive ’50-win club’ in a single season. In the history of the Challenger Circuit, only seven other players have won so many matches in a campaign. He concluded his breakout season with a 50-13 record, reaching a career-high No.60 in the FedEx ATP rankings. Argentina’s Tomas Martin Etcheverry finished second with 49 wins.

Meanwhile, Jenson Brooksby was the most consistent player, with a winning percentage of 88.5 (min. 25 games played). The American star took full advantage of his opportunities, winning 23 of the 26 games played in 2021. Sebastian Baez (86.3) and Tallon Griekspoor (85.7) were the only other players with at least 80% of games won.

Baez, meanwhile, became the most successful 20-and-under in Challenger history. His 44 game wins are the most important in a single season for a player before his 21st birthday.

Griekspoor breaks title record
At the start of the year, only three players had won six titles in a single season on the ATP Challenger Tour. But in 2021 alone, three other players equaled that record, with Griekspoor (8), Bonzi (6) and Baez (6) winning trophy after trophy.

Griekspoor, 25, notched the record for most crowns in a season with his victory in Tenerife, Spain. He would add an unprecedented eighth piece of silverware with a title the following week in the Slovak capital of Bratislava. In fact, since falling to Novak Djokovic at the US Open, the Dutchman has not lost another game for the rest of the year. He will win five consecutive titles on the ATP Challenger Tour in October and November, dominating the clay courts of Murcia and Napoli I & II, before moving on to the hard courts of Tenerife and Bratislava. His 25-game winning streak is the longest in Challenger history.

Bonzi, meanwhile, set the tone in 2021, becoming the first of the trio to cross the six-title milestone. His victories at Potchefstroom and Ostrava were followed by a 20-game winning streak, winning four consecutive trophies in Segovia, Saint-Tropez, Cassis and Rennes.

Baez reached nine circuit-leading finals in 2021, all on clay, with titles coming on Chilean soil in Concepcion and Santiago I & II, as well as in Zagreb, Buenos Aires and Campinas.

Teen Titans
Nine different teenagers made up a total of 15 Challenger titles this year, with Holger Rune (4), Juan Manuel Cerundolo (3) and Jiri Lehecka (2) the only players with multiple crowns.

At 18 years and 6 months, Rune became the fourth youngest player to win his fourth Challenger title. Only Richard Gasquet (2003), 17, and Carlos Alcaraz (2021) and Felix Auger-Aliassime (2018), 18, were younger.

Cerundolo made Argentine history this year, becoming the third youngest player from his country to win three Challenger titles. Only Juan Martin del Potro and Guillermo Coria were younger when they won their third trophy.

Alcaraz, Dominic Stricker, Dalibor Svrcina, Brandon Nakashima, Carlos Gimeno Valero and Giulio Zeppieri were the only other teenage winners of the year. At the age of 18 and 18 days, Alcaraz became the youngest champion of 2021 with his victory in Oeiras, Portugal.

The biggest engines of the Top 100
The four biggest players in the year-end Top 100 won multiple Challenger titles in 2021. Cerundolo led the way, leaping 252 places to climb to 89th place at the end of the year in the FedEx ATP rankings.

Title Leaders by country
Players from 35 countries have won titles this year. Argentina have won 20 titles at the top of the circuit with 11 different players, with the United States coming close behind with 19 wins.

In fact, the Argentinian contingent tied the record for most titles in a season, with Argentina 2016, Argentina 2007 and France 2005 the other members of the “Club of 20 titles”. Baez led the charge with six crowns, alongside Cerundolo with three and Etcheverry and Coria with two apiece.

Dimitar Kuzmanov became the first Bulgarian Challenger champion since Grigor Dimitrov in 2011, with his title in Barcelona.

ATP Tour and ATP Challenger Tour Winners
Four players have won trophies on the ATP Tour and the ATP Challenger Tour this year.

Duplicate Title Leaders
Nuno Borges and Francisco Cabral topped the doubles circuit in 2021, together winning six tag team titles leading the tour. The Portuguese pair made the most of their home opportunities, winning trophies in Oeiras, Braga and Maia I & II, while also winning in Tenerife, Spain and Manama, Bahrain. France’s Sadio Doumbia and Fabien Reboul won the second most titles of any team, together winning five trophies.

Orlando Luz has won the most doubles titles of any player, winning eight times with four different partners. He won alongside Rafael Matos (4), Felipe Meligeni Rodrigues Alves (2), Sergio Galdos (1) and Aleksandr Nedovyesov (1).

Fast facts

• A total of 39 different players enjoyed their first moments of glory This year. Holger Rune was the youngest of the group at 18 years and 1 month old, while Italian Franco Agamenone, 28, was the oldest.
• A total of 30 #NextGenATP stars (born 2000 or later) won titles. Jenson Brooksby became the youngest to win three titles in the first four months of a Challenger season. His 19-2 record until April was the second best start to the season, behind Janko Tipsarevic’s 20-0 record in 2017.
• Qualifications has won 10 titles, with Zizou Bergs going the distance twice, winning seven matches in eight days in St. Petersburg and Lille.
• Longest final: The longest final on record at three hours and seven minutes, with Nikola Milojevic beating Dimitar Kuzmanov 2-6, 6-2, 7-6 (5) in Zadar, Croatia.
• Shortest completed final: In the 46th minute, Mats Moraing beat Hugo Gaston 6-2, 6-1 in Tulln, Austria.
• Juan Manuel Cerundolo and Flavio Cobolli contested the first final all teenagers since 2017, in Rome.
• Older winners: The ATP Challenger Tour featured two champions aged 35 and over in 2021. Andreas Seppi, 37, won in Biella, Italy, while a Pablo Cuevas, 35, won in Lyon, in France.
• This year, four players registered at least one match point in the Challenger final: Emilio Gomez (3) in Salinas, Mats Moraing (2) in Forli, Max Purcell (1) in Nur-Sultan and Lukas Lacko (1) in Mallorca.
• Liam Broady won his first title of his eighth final. This is the second most Finals to win a first title in Challenger history, with Jan-Lennard Struff and Martin Rodriguez both claiming their first crowns in their ninth final.
• Tallon Griekspoor’s The 25-game winning streak is the longest in the history of the Challenger, surpassing the 24 consecutive victories of Juan Ignacio Chela in 2001.
• Francisco Cerundolo and Juan Manuel Cerundolo became the sixth pair of brothers to win titles in the same season.
• At 15 years and 10 months, Gabriel Debru becomes the fourth youngest player to win a Challenger match since 2000, with his first round victory in Roanne, France. The Frenchman rallied to a set to defeat Andrea Pellegrino 4-6, 6-2, 6-3, before falling to eventual champion Hugo Grenier.
• At n ° 874, Dominic Stricker becomes the lowest ranked champion in the history of the Challenger with its victory in Lugano, Switzerland.
• At 40 years and 1 month, Feliciano Lopez became the second Finalist 40 years old in the history of the Challenger, joining Ivo Karlovic (Houston 2019) with his second place in Tenerife.