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By Adrianna Outlaw
© Fred Mullane and Susan Mullane/Camerawork USA

(July 6, 2010) Soaring to her 13th career Grand Slam championships with a thorough thrashing in the Wimbledon final, Serena Williams showed she hasn't completed her body of work.

Williams' work on her body may well add more years to her career.

The World No. 1 tells Harper's Bazaar Magazine she celebrated her fifth Australian Open title in January by doing some major renovations  — on her body.

"I wanted to get really fit. I wanted to lose some weight. So I've been doing Pilates and yoga, trying to lean out my body so I won’t be bulky," Williams tells Harper's Bazaar writer Laura Brown.



A regimen of Pilates two to three times a week,  combined with "a couple of hours of hitting, then an hour or two of cardio and strengthening in the gym," has been Williams' pre-tournament preparation. She also opts to make the half-mile walk up a hill to Venus'  LA house when she's on the west coast, but Serena has banned the scale from her home and erased the dreaded "D" word from her vocabulary.

"I don't even know the D word," Serena says. "(I eat) smaller portions of every meal, a lot of grilled or baked chicken or fish, and steamed veggies...I can never turn down a good piece of cherry pie. But all I know is that in 10 years, I don't want to be as wide as this couch."

Serena has not only defined herself as one of the greatest players of all time, she's redefined the body type image many in the sport once stereotyped for champions. Indeed, early in her career some coaches said Williams would never win multiple majors unless she underwent breast reduction surgery, asserting she would never be able to maintain balance through her strokes because of her voluptuous frame.

While the young Serena grew up wishing she could streamline her muscular frame more in the vein of the lithe, lean Venus, Serena said she's now completely comfortable with her curvy shape.

"I was 23 when I realized that I wasn't Venus. She's totally different," Serena says. "I'm super-curvy. I have big boobs and this massive butt. She's tall and she's like a model and she fits everything. I was growing up, wanting to be her, wanting to look like her, and I was always fitting in her clothes, but then one day I couldn't. But it's fine. Now I'm obviously good, but it's a weird thing."



Of course, even champions have moments of self doubt. Serena, who has a well-earned reputation for detailing her on-court style right down to the satellite-sized hoop earrings she once wore in Australia to the sparkling, silver fingernails she displayed at Wimbledon, says her moment of truth came not on the court, but in the locker room when she was having second thoughts about wearing the famed, black, skin-diving suit tight cat suit on court at the 2002 US Open.

"I was like, 'I can't go out there. Oh, my God, I'm so nervous, I can't go out. I feel really exposed.' " Williams recalls. She calmed her nerves asking fellow Grand Slam champ Justine Henin for fashion advice (some would say that's like asking Dinara Safina for serving tips).

The more traditional Henin recommended Serena drop the cat suit in favor of a traditional tennis top and skirt.

Not surprisingly, Serena blew off Henin's advice and unleashed her inner Tigress with the fashion statement that made tennis history.

"I felt so comfortable," Serena tells Harper's Bazaar, "and after that, I owned it."

Owning her own distinctive physique with pride has been an achievement for Serena, who says she's dropped from a size 12 to a size 10 thanks to Pilates. And while, like most of us, she likes some parts of her body better than others  — Williams cites her smile as her favorite feature and her biceps as her least favorite feature — the girl who grew up dreaming of fitting into her older sister's clothes is comfortable in her own skin.

"Since I don't look like every other girl, it takes a while to be okay with that. To be different. But different is good," Serena says.

Besides, she's put her arms to good use.

"When I was six or seven in a swimsuit — I look back at those picture, and my arms are cut and my legs are strong," she says. "I didn't realize that I was really fit and most people aren't. To this day, I don't love my arms. People want more fit arms, but my arms are too fit. But I'm not complaining. They pay my bills."