Wednesday, December 10, 2014

  Richest former professional athlete: Ion Tiriac breaks Guinness World Records' record (VIDEO)

BUCHAREST, Romania -- Ion Tiriac, 75, a Romanian businessman and former professional tennis and ice hockey player, who won 294 matches including 22 titles as a doubles player and 167 matches as a singles player, the current owner of the Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open and the owner of the license for the BRD N?stase ?iriac Trophy tennis tournament, has a personal net worth of $2 billion, setting the new world record for The richest former professional athlete in the world, according to the World Record Academy: www.worldrecordacademy.com/ .

  Photo: Ion ?iriac, a Romanian businessman and former professional tennis and ice hockey player, has a personal net worth of $2 billion. He was Romania's first billionaire and the richest former professional athlete in the world. He is the current owner of the Mutua Madrileña Madrid Open and the owner of the license for the BRD N?stase ?iriac Trophy tennis tournament. His net worth is exactly double Michael Jordan's.
Photo: Tiriac Holdeing ( enlarge photo )

The Guinness World Records' record for the richest fashion designer is Giorgio Armani (Italy). Clothes, watches, perfumes, homeware, and hotels all bear his name an incredible achievement for a medical school drop-out who's now worth a record $5.3 billion (£3.3 billion).

  Guinness World Records also recognized the world record for the richest person alive; it is Carlos Slim Helú (Mexico), with an estimated worth of $53.5 billion (£35.23 billion) to top the 2010 Forbes list of the World's Billionaires.

   Ion Tiriac had never earned more than a few million dollars as a professional athlete but within two years of the Berlin Wall falling, Ion ?iriac was worth over $100 million. By 2000 he was worth $500 million. In 2005 his net worth was estimated at $900 million. In 2007, Forbes recognized Ion Tiriac as the 840th richest person in the world with a net worth of $1 billion.

   As a doubles player, Ion ?iriac won 294 matches including 22 titles. As a singles player, he won 167 matches including a number of significant regional titles (but no majors). He was a member of two finals-reaching Davis cup teams and he won a gold medal as both a singles and doubles player at the 1965 World Summer games in Budapest,.

    Ion ?iriac has a personal net worth of $2 billion. He was Romania 's first billionaire and the richest athlete in the world. His net worth is exactly double Michael Jordan's, The Celebrity NetWorth reported.

   When Ion Tiriac retired in 1980, he immediately became Ilie N?stase's full time coach and eventually went on to coach for superstars such as Mary Joe Fernández, Guillermo Vilas, Marat Safin, Steffi Graf, and Goran Ivaniševi?. Between 1984 and 1993, Ion personally orchestrated Boris Becker's ascent to become the #1 ranked player in the world (1991).

   In 1990, Ion founded Banca ?iriac, the very first privately owned bank in post-communist Romania.    He then went on to launch retail businesses, auto dealerships, an airline and an insurance company.    He also owns a large residential and commercial real estate portfolio.

   Today his companies include Tiriac Holdings , TiriacAIR , UniCredit Tiriac Ban k, Allianz-Tiriac Asigurari Romania , TiriacAuto , Tiriac Leasing , and Tiriac Travel. One of his most notable real estate ventures has been the Stejarii Country Club in northern Bucharest.
   In addition to being a country club, Stejarii features a residential complex and a museum that houses over 100 rare luxury cars that are part of Ion's personal collection (see below video) .

    In 1990, Ion Tiriac founded the Madrid Open . It has since grown into one of the most important tournaments in the tennis world. He exclusively owns the license for the tournament and funds the operation himself with the goal to some day turn it into an event on the same level as larger Grand Slams like London, Paris and Melbourne. Ion is also a qualified professional pilot.

    In 2013, Ion was elected to the International Tennis Hall of Fame (see 2nd video below).