Tampa resident wins longest tennis match ever

It's one for the history books. Tampa's John Isner and France's Nicholas Mahut played the longest match in the history of professional tennis over the course of three days at Wimbledon.

"You can't even imagine it going past 20 [games] all, but I don't know I guess it was just meant to be," said Isner after the match.

Isner trains at Saddlebrook Academy in Wesley Chapel.

The marathon match went on for three days. Isner and Mahut played an unbelievable five sets, 183 games, 11 hours and five minutes of tennis. Millions watched wondering how and when it would all end. The match is talker among tennis players in the Bay Area.

"I got a text 59-59 and I'm like what does that mean? And I'm thinking stats like aces or something. They're like 'no, 59-59. The match stopped at 59 games,'" said tennis coach Lili Rivera, who is an instructor with Tennis Connection.

Rivera says the match was a great show of sportsmanship and skill for her students. They watched Isner and Mahut, not believing what they were seeing.

"I was speechless. I couldn't believe it. It was 58-58 when I started watching it," said 15-year-old Vishal Thumar, who hopes to play tennis in college. He says Isner and Mahut are inspirations. He hopes to meet Isner when he's back in Tampa. Like Vishal, Sydney Labban has big tennis dreams. She says the longest match ever was worth all 665 minutes.

"It was a good feeling watching it because I want to do that one day when I get older," said Labban.

Rivera met Isner at a tennis fundraiser in Plant City in 2008. She says he was just as impressive off the court.

"It's nice to have young people creating history because they broke all of the records, with aces with the length of time on the courts it was impressive I've never seen anything like that," said Rivera. "I've never had to push myself that far. I don't know if I could, honestly. I've never seen anybody do it."

Isner beat Mahut in the fifth set 70 to 68, winning the match.