The ATP Awards continue to be handed this week, and few were as predictable as Valentin Vacherot winning Breakthrough of the Year. The 27-year-old Monegasque, winner of the 2025 Rolex Shanghai Masters, claims the award after his historic victory at the Masters 1,000 where, only in his 27th Tour-level match, he claimed the prestigious title... defeating his cousin, Arthur Rinderknech.
Vacherot was outside of the top 250 in August 2025. He entered the Shanghai Masters as a wild card being ranked 204 in the world... and one week later, he was 40th in the world, having claimed his maiden title defeating Novak Djokovic, Tallon Griekspoor and Holger Rune in the process. He became the lowest-ranked ATP Masters 1000 champion in history, and will start 2026 ranked 31 in the world.
Vacherot's incredible success story and historic feat earned him the award over the other nominees, Jack Draper, Joao Fonseca and Jakub Mensik: "All this work came into the light a little bit in October in Shanghai and Paris, and now I have my highest ranking. I'm really happy to have won the award and hopefully this will bring many more for the following years", Vacherot said.
ATP is giving this week all the Awards. It was announced previously that Carlos Alcaraz had won the Stefan Edberg Sportsmanship Award and Andrey Rublev won the Arthur Ashe Humanitarian Award.