Ricardo Acioly

Ricardo Acioly was born in Rio de Janeiro but at the age of eight moved to Brasília. Both his parents and his older brother, Claudius, played tennis with seriousness and dedication. At 14, he was the Orange Bowl champion.
In 1986, he began his professional career. That year, he achieved good results in simple terms, such as passing the US Open qualifying, but the most expressive were in doubles, as the first title in ATP tournaments in Vienna, Austria, alongside Polish Wojtek Fibak. He eventually became a doubles specialist with three ATP Tour titles (Vienna, Geneva and Guarujá), and three runner-up titles (Washington DC, Brasília and Maceió), as well as several challenger titles.

His great partners in the doubles were Fibak, Luiz Mattar (ATP title in Geneva), Pablo Albano (they won in Mexico City in 1989), Mauro Menezes (ATP runner in Brasília and four challenger titles), Dácio Campos (ATP Guarujá and some challengers) as well as having played with Mats Wilander, former world number one.

His main ranking in doubles was 46 in 1986. He is among the 10 best tennis players of the history of Brazil in this modality. He reached his highest ATP singles ranking on December 29, 1986, when he became the World No. 228.

Acioly represented Brazil in the men's doubles at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, partnering Luiz Mattar. They advanced in the second round, but lost to the French duo formed by Guy Forget and Henri Leconte.
He was a Davis Cup player (in doubles) during the years of 1987, 1988 and 1989.
He retired in 1992.

He is considered one of the best coaches in Brazil, he was Fernando Meligeni's coach for seven years, and he trained and still trains many youngsters and players who are starting their professional careers.

In 1995, Ricardo began a new chapter in his life as a coach, and was chosen to be Fernando Meligeni's coach, with whom he did a fantastic job, making him evolve and achieve great results like the Atlanta Olympics in 1996 with "Fininho" reaching the semifinals, and the semifinal at Roland Garros in 1999. In total, have been seven years with Meligeni. He also coached Gabriela Sabatini.

In 1998, he took over the Brazilian Davis Cup team as a captain, from 1998 to 2003, leading his country to a semifinal when he lost to Australia. Currently Acioly trains talented Brazilian players such as Franco Ferreiro and João Olavo Souza among others.