Alycia Parks burst onto the scene with a Venus Williams record – but Wimbledon is the stage for her to live up to comparisons to Serena.
The 24-year-old is far from the first US tennis star to idolise the 23-time Grand Slam champion, but only the best can call her a mentor.
There are plenty of on-court comparisons between Parks and WilliamsInstagramParks will get her latest Wimbledon campaign underway on Tuesday, against Belinda Bencic, with Serena undoubtedly keeping tabs.
Having qualified for the main draw for the All England Club last summer, the tennis icon was quick to check in with her protégé.
“I’m pretty close to her now… she’s such a mom, I feel like I’m one of her kids,” Parks told Wimbledon‘s official website.
“She’s texted already today saying ‘we’re not worried about the last match, we’re just worried about the next match.’ It’s a positive thing she’s told me to always look forward.
“We’ll talk ahead of the main draw, she’ll want me to ‘stay focused, one point, one match at a time, then you’ll look back and congratulate yourself when you’re holding up the trophy.'”
The pair have trod similar paths from grassroots to grand slams, with Parks’ dad Michael coaching both her and sister Mikayla as teens.
And it’s not lost on Parks that her story of a father coaching athletic sisters to hone their skills against one another on the public courts will never be unique to her family.
“When I watched King Richard, there were a lot of scenes [that felt familiar],” she told WTA Tennis in December 2022.
“We kind of did it that way, too. It was so weird because it was so similar.”
Such an experience meant Williams was best-placed to offer Parks advice to combat her woes before last year’s grass court season.
Parks once acted as Williams’ body doubleGetty Serena Williams has won Wimbledon seven timesGettyAlycia Parks career bio
Prize money: $ 2,180,235
Career record: 207–206
Career titles: 1 (Lyon Open, 2023)
Highest ranking: No. 40 (August 14, 2023)
Current ranking: No. 47 (16 June 2025)
Australian Open best result: 3R (2024)
French Open best result: 2R (2025)
Wimbledon best result: 2R (2023)
US Open best result: 1R (2021, 2023)
Parks had been in the tangles of a 13-match losing streak from January to May 2024 before reuniting with her father as her coach.
“Serena is a big inspiration, she helps me a lot. I talk to her here and there. When I have a question I ask her and she always gives me a good answer,” Parks said in an interview with Clay.
“I think the biggest thing she told me was ‘go back to what you were doing when you were winning’ and then she was saying obviously your parents know you better than anyone else and then she told me to go back to my dad, so that’s what I did,” she added.
Parks’ losing run started at the hands of Coco Gauff, another star who has been inextricably linked to the Williams family.
The pair’s first professional clash came at the third round of the 2024 Australian Open, with Gauff winning in straight sets.
The two have known each other since childhood, and ironically, tennis is not the only career in which they have been compared to each other.
Gauff thrashed Parks 6-0, 6-2 in their first Grand Slam meetingGetty Both athletes have trained in Florida and have known each other for a decadeGettyWhen Gauff was nine, she was cast as the body double for a young Serena in a Delta Airlines commercial shot in Palm Beach.
Years later, Parks was roped in to carry out the same role for her idol in a Gatorade commercial when she was a teenager.
The world No.47 has continued to try and emulate Serena and Venus with her tennis performances since turning professional.
“It felt good at the US Open that I got to hit with both of them,” she told the Palm Beach Post two years ago.
“Serena especially, because I look up to Serena. She’s the GOAT of tennis. What can you do besides look up to her? She’s literally tennis.”
“I pattern myself after Serena because of her serve, but I also like Venus’ movement.”
Park wears a ‘winner’ gold necklace from Serena’s jewellery line, but like Coco, her career remains interwined with her sister, Venus.
For the latter, she burst on the scene as a precocious 15-year-old to beat the 45-year-old at Wimbledon in 2019.
Parks exited Wimbledon in round one last yearGettyPark, meanwhile, tied Venus’ record for the fastest women’s serve in US Open history in her first-ever appearance in a Grand Slam.
In 2021, Park, who only qualified for the tournament after Venus no longer needed her wildcard, clocked a speed of 129 mph against Olga Danilović – only behind Georgina Garcia Perez’s all-time WTA record at 136.7 mph effort.
“Her serve is, I’m telling you, when they’re coming at me… Oh my god, it’s like Serena peak, that’s how good her serve is when it goes in,” Rennae Stubbs said on The Rennae Stubbs Tennis Podcast in 2023.
Such an asset is particularly beneficial on the Wimbledon surface – now it’s time for Park to prove the Williams’ legacy lives on…
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