Amélie Mauresmo: Andy Murray Makes History By Picking FEMALE Tennis Coach

Andy Murray's new coach, Amelie Mauresmo, is a tennis champion herself, so she's got what it takes to win.

Andy Murray’s making tennis history once again. He announced this weekend that former world No.1 Amélie Mauresmo will replace Ivan Lendl as his coach for the grass-court season.

This is big very news, not only for the reigning Wimbledon champ, but also for women in sport. It’s rare to see women taking such a crucial behind-the-scenes role in men's tennis, so we’re very excited to see how this dynamic partnership will blossom. 

 Here’s what you need to know about this awe-inspiring Frenchwoman:

She’s one of Andy’s idols ‘Amélie is someone I have always looked up to and admired. She’s faced adversity plenty of times in her career but was an amazing player and won major titles,’ He said of his decision to go with Mauresmo

‘I have a very strong coaching team already in place but I think Amélie brings with her experience and tactical expertise and will push us all to improve. Everyone I know talks very highly of Amélie, as a person and coach, and I’m convinced that her joining the team will help us push on. I want to win more grand slams.’ 

She’s a champion herself Mauresmo was ranked world No. 1 for 39 weeks in 2004. She also won The Australian Open and Wimbledon in 2006. She retired in 2009, but has kept one foot on the court while coaching Michael Llodra during the grass-court season in 2010 and helping in Marion Bartoli's win at Wimbledon last year. 

She’s one of very few women to coach the sport …let alone to coach men’s tennis. Others include Tatiana Naumko, who coached former top-10 player Andrei Chesnokov and Billie Jean King, who coached Tim Mayotte.

She rides a Harley In 2011, she took some time off to ride a Harley Davidson around the western United States.

She’s French Mauresmo was the first French tennis player to be world No.1 since the implementation of computerised rankings in the 70s.

She’s super focused and goal-oriented ‘It's a professional goal for me - this is what I'm interested in,’ she told the BBC when asked about her role as a female coach. ‘That's not my big concern right now…I want to help Andy. It's the only thing that I have in mind right now.’

She’s gay At 19, she beat American tennis star Lindsay Davenport and the Australian Open and came out to the international press following her win. Though she faced ridicule, the young champ-to-be said, ‘"I felt liberated and it showed in my game," and that 'there are dozens of other players like me who say nothing, are often ill at ease and even unhappy."

She’s making Andy’s mum proud This partnership is sure to keep Andy’s mum, Judy happy as well. She was instrumental in his early tennis career and has been a huge advocate for female coaches in Britain.

It’s not just tennis for this athlete In 2010, she ran the New York City Marathon in 3 hours, 40 minutes. She’s also into skiing, go-karts, horseback riding, surfing in Biarritz and enjoys red wine. (She’s got a wine cellar at home)