He Yecong is a name that few people will be familiar with, but he has dominated headlines at the Shenzhen Open this weekend.
The 24-year-old was bidding to reach for his first ATP World Tour main draw. On Saturday he got off to a strong start by defeating sixth seed Mohamed Safwat in the opening round of qualifying, who retired during the second set tiebreaker. In the aftermath of his victory, He made sure it would be a day to remember. Walking towards his girlfriend in the crowd and asking her to marry him.
“I prepared this proposal before this trip,” the 24-year-old told atpworldtour.com. “But I didn’t tell many people about that because I didn’t want to put pressure on myself. I figured if I couldn’t get a win today I could always wait till next time.”
According to Chinese website ifeng.com, He’s girlfriend is a former swimmer who had previously participated in the Chinese national swimming championships. She said yes to the engagement.
“I am really grateful that she has my back and supports me unconditionally.” He said. “She already retired and is a swimming coach now, so she can’t always travel with me. It’s lucky that this weekend, she got days off because of the mid-autumn festival. Everything was so perfect for this proposal.”
The proposal was done in front of fellow tennis player Di Wu and Zhizhen Zhang, who was there to support He. Both of those players have secured a place in the main draw in Shenzhen after being granted wild cards.
Despite the joyous occasion, He fell in the second round of qualifying on Sunday. Taking on India’s Ramkumar Ramanathan, he lost 6-1, 6-1, in under an hour.
He is currently ranked 813th in the world, but has been as high as 492nd. His sole Futures title was achieved in Hong Kong last year.
