"Super happy" - Leylah Fernandez expresses delight as younger sister Bianca earns her 1st Pac-12 Tennis Player of the Week award for UCLA
Leylah Fernandez reacted to her sister Bianca Fernandez earning her first Pac-12 Woman's Tennis Player of the Week award.
The award was presented to Bianca Fernandez for the week of April 1-7. That week, the UCLA player emerged victorious in all of her six matches across both singles and doubles. The win also marked UCLA's sixth Pac-12 Women's Tennis Player of the Week award in 2024.
The 2021 US Open runner-up took to social media to express her excitement on her sister's achievement. She used a few heart emojis and wrote on her Instagram stories:
"Yay!!!" I'm super happy for you @biancajolietennis,"
Prior to UCLA, some of the highlights of Bianca Fernandez's college tennis career include reaching doubles final round at ITF W60 Saskatoon event, ITF W25 Santa Margherita di Pula event and ITF W15 Fort-de-France (Martinique) in 2023.
In 2023, Bianca Fernandez had also earned a spot in singles quarterfinal round at ITF W25 Santa Margarita di Pula event. In 2022, she made singles semifinal rounds at two ITF W15 Santo Domingo events and at ITF W15 Lima event in 2019.
Leylah Fernandez and her sister Bianca started a foundation in 2022
Sisters Bianca and Leylah Fernandez are part of a close-knit family with parents Jorge and Irene Fernandez and elder sister Jodeci.
In 2022, the sisters had announced the start of their family's foundation, Leylah Annie and Family via social media. The foundation is geared towards making education and sports more accessible through scholarships and grants.
"It’s time to announce the Leylah Annie & Family Foundation! My family and I have been working hard, and we’re so excited to launch this project," Fernandez said via Instagram.
"We started this foundation because we believe access to character-building and life-changing opportunities through education and sports should never be limited," she added in the same post.
On-court, the sisters had first teamed up for Bianca Fernandez's debut at the 2022 Monterrey Open. The then 19-year-old won her first WTA match at the 2022 Canadian Open in a doubles event. The sister-duo defeated Sara Sorribes Tormo and Kirsten Flipkens in the first round of the 2022 edition of the tournament.
The same year, they also partnered up for an exhibition match at the Delray Beach Open and WTA 125 event Albierto Tampico in Mexico.
Leylah Fernandez recently competed at the Charleston Open, where she was the 14th seed but suffered a 6-4, 6-4 defeat to Sloane Stephens.