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So, aged 19, Gottfried von Cramm leased a flat in swank suburban Charlottenburg, simultaneously entered the University of Berlin as a student of law (his family wanted him to go into diplomacy) and the exclusive Rot-Weiss Club as a student of tennis. He was soon spending most of the money that came from Oelber on lessons with famed Professional Robert Kleinschroth. Two years later, after he had progressed to the point of beating Tilden-trained Wilbur Coen Jr., he got his father's permission to marry his childhood friend, dark, vivacious Baroness Lisa von Dobeneck, and to abandon his studies in favor of a career in tennis.

For methodical Gottfried von Cramm that meant a rigid training schedule with no alcohol or tobacco, eleven hours' sleep every night, long hours of practice at the Rot-Weiss club with Teacher Kleinschrroth, who, he now believes, "contributed more to my game than any other instructor." What Teacher Kleinschroth contributed was not only an array of effective sV , s but the habit of not depending on iy one of them. Froitzheim had taught him the necessity of sound ground strokes and good physical condition. All these qualities were beginning to be apparent in 1931 when he handily won his first big tournament, the Greek National Singles Championship, but when Gottfried von Cramm returned to Germany, he was not included in the German Davis Cup team. The team lost to South Africa, and von Cramm had the satisfaction of giving a sound beating to the South African No. i, Louis Raymond, in a later tournament. When he further distinguished himself that year by reaching the fourth round at Wimbledon, he became Germany's white hope on the Davis Cup team.

Since then Gottfried von Cramm, the only great post-War player in a country where until recently tennis and squash courts were discouragingly rare, has put Germany into the Davis Cup interzone final four times (1932-35-36-37). He has played 74 Davis Cup matches and lost only 14, five in his first season. He has defeated every leading amateur in the world. Last year in the French champion ships, fortified by a cleaner backhand stroke he had learned from William Tatem Tilden, he beat Fred Perry for the title. Then the following month at Wimbledon he strained a thigh muscle and lost to Perry in the final.

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