A tennis legend set to provide expert analysis for the BBC at Wimbledon is married to a former Miss Universe finalist and ex-model, despite their 16-year age gap
One of the greatest tennis players of all time was virtually unstoppable at Wimbledon – and away from the court she has also had a remarkable love life.
A genius on grass, Martina Navratilova claimed a record nine ladies’ singles titles at the All England Club – a Grand Slam record for women in the Open Era. Six of those triumphs came in consecutive years between 1982 and 1987, while she also enjoyed remarkable success in doubles, winning seven women’s doubles crowns and four mixed doubles trophies. The 69-year-old will return to SW19 this week as part of the BBC’s live coverage, joining a punditry panel featuring fellow tennis icons John McEnroe, Billie Jean King, Andre Agassi and Pat Cash.
The Czech-American icon, who spent an incredible 332 weeks ranked world No. 1 during her illustrious playing career, currently lives across the Atlantic in Miami with her wife, former model Julia Lemigova. Aged a whopping 16 years younger than Navratilova, Lemigova has lived a fascinating life of her own.
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Born in Moscow to a former Red Army colonel, she was crowned Miss USSR in 1990 before finishing runner-up at the Miss Universe pageant the following year. Before meeting Navratilova, she had a daughter with French banker Edouard Stern, who was later murdered by his mistress in 2005, and also has another daughter from a previous relationship.
More recently, she has earned acclaim as one of the stars of The Real Housewives of Miami – creating history as the first housewife in the franchise’s history to be wed to another woman. The pair married in New York in 2014 after Navratilova proposed live on television during the US Open before thousands of onlookers.
But their love story began many years earlier, with the duo first crossing paths in a Paris nightclub in 2000. Speaking on Married to a Celebrity: The Survival Guide, the tennis icon recounted the tale of their initial meeting.
“I was at a club with some friends, a gay bar in Paris,” she said. “We’re sitting here, we’re dancing and then we sit down and then there’s this gorgeous woman standing at the bar and she’s like…looking at me. I gave this Russian look to her. Really, it was more like, ‘Okay, you are coming to talk to me now.”
However, love did not blossom straight away, with the pair instead reconnecting eight years later during the French Open. After rekindling their romance, Navratilova and Lemigova began discussing creating a family together, but arrangements were delayed in early 2023 when the 18-time Grand Slam winner was diagnosed with stage 1 throat and breast cancer.
“When you’re adopting a child, it has to be about the child. And, right now, it’s everything about Martina, and for her getting healthy, so we are putting it on hold,” Lemigova explained. “You know, we were thinking any moment, the agency would call and give us happy news that we’re going to have a baby… instead, we are fighting two cancers.”
Fortunately, Navratilova later announced that year that she was free from cancer, enabling the couple to reconsider their plans to expand their family. In August 2024, they expressed they were “over the moon” after adopting two young boys.
Speaking to Entertainment Tonight in 2025 about the adoption and how Navratilova’s bond with the boys contrasts with the relationship she has with her two daughters, Lemigova stated: “There’s a difference between girls and boys. She’s now with the boys, playing sports with them, teaching tennis, teaching baseball, teaching basketball.
“She’s having such a blast. She’s becoming like a kid herself, I feel, like 20 years younger. It’s a completely different Martina that I’m seeing.”