Wimbledon 2015: Serena Williams overcomes Garbine Muguruza to win sixth Wimbledon title

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Serena Williams has defeated Spain’s Garbine Muguruza to win Wimbledon for the sixth time and hold the so-called “Serena Slam” – all four Grand Slams at the same time.

The top seed won in straight sets, overcoming Muguruza 6-4, 6-4.

She also won the £1.88m prize money the All England Club awarded to singles champions in 2015, adding to the $69,676,428 (£44.90m) she has already won over her career, to take her career earnings over $70m.

Serena Williams was already the highest-earning female player of all time, with Maria Sharapova holding a distant second place with $35.8m.

Read more: Serena Williams beats Maria Sharapova to take career earnings past $70m

At 33, Williams is the oldest female winner of a major in the Open era, winning in excess of $11.5m at Wimbledon over her career and more than $9m this year across all tournaments.

In contrast, her opponent Muguruza had made only $2.05m career prize money before the tournament, with the world number 20 now adding $1.45m to that. In fact, the 21 year old has earnt more at Wimbledon than in the rest of 2015, where she has amassed $861,677.

Looking at the different slams, Serena has won the following from each:

  • Winning Wimbledon, Williams pocketed £1.88m
  • After being victorious at Roland-Garros she took home €1.8m (£1.29m)
  • The US Open title added $3m (£1.93m) to Serena’s career prize money
  • The Australian Open awarded Williams $2.4m (£1.55m)

And all tournaments are gearing up their prize money:

  • In 2015 the Australian Open increased its prize money by 10 per cent
  • The French open took the total prize money pool to €28m, as part of a four year plan where there will be an increase of €2m each year taking prize money to €30m in 2016
  • Wimbledon increased its prize money by 7.6 percent
  • US Open has a pool of $38.3m and we can expect a rise in 2015 as the tournament moves towards a $50m pool by 2018.

Read more: Prize money for Grand Slams keeps increasing

If tournaments keep increasing their prize money, and Serena can keep this form up – and she probably will as she chases down Steffi Graf’s 22 Grand Slam titles record – she will be able to put more distance in terms of prize money between herself and competitors, at an even faster rate.