Long before Venus and Serena Williams began dominating the world of women’s tennis, the road for African-American female tennis players was being paved by Zina Garrison. Garrison was ranked as high as #4 in the world among women back in 1989, and in 1990 she became the first African-American woman to reach the Wimbledon finals in 1990 where she was defeated by the 1,342nd lesbian to reach the Wimbledon final, Martina Navratilova.

Since she retired in 1996 Zina has spent her time working with the United States Tennis Association (USTA) as a coach in the Fed Cup, and then as captain of the Fed Cup team since 2004. She also coached the U.S. Women’s tennis team in the 2004 and 2008 Olympics. Well, she was recently let go by the USTA as Fed Cup captain and Zina isn’t quite sure what she’d done to be let go from the job aside from being black, so now she’s suing the USTA.

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