Dominika Cibulkova's life is oddly fabulous

I've been a huge fan of Dominika Cibulkova for a long time. The truth is, I love an underdog, and I think much of my adoration of Cibulkova has to do with her fitting that role perfectly. In a sport that favors extremely tall people, who would expect a 5'3" woman like Dominika to hold her own with giants of the sport (both figurative and actual) like Maria Sharapova and Venus Williams?

But, in fact, Cibulkova has shown the world that height is only one facet of athleticism, and that short girls can kick ass and take names in women's tennis: her career highlights include winning the year-end championship in 2016, reaching the Australian Open final in 2014, as well as a slew of impressive wins over strong top-10 players.

Cibulkova’s on-court presence is captivating. She’s fiery and tenacious. She seems to have boundless energy, bouncing in place to psyche herself up even after the longest, most exhausting rallies. While some players make a point of keeping their cool between points regardless of what’s going on in the match, Dominika wears her heart on her sleeve, showing us her frustration just as much as her excitement. She also doesn’t mince words about player controversies when others have tiptoed around the issue. Perhaps the most well known expression of Cibulkova’s on-court excitement is her passionate cry of “Pome!” (the equivalent of “Come on!” in her native Slovakian.) It’s also worth noting that, on court, Cibulkova doesn’t seem particularly fashion-conscious. While many WTA players opt for frilly, flowing, colorful match attire, Dominika usually favors a very simple monochromatic tank dress.

When I first peeked into Cibulkova's world through the keyhole that is Instagram, I was thrown for a loop. Keep in mind that, with a few exceptions, most professional tennis players lead fairly mundane lives. The glorious moments we see on TV are the culmination of players’ methodical routines of training on the court and in the gym, maintaining their diet, getting treatments for all their pains and injuries, and constantly traveling from one tournament to the next. For the most part, tennis players' worlds are pretty dull, which is why I was kinda shocked by the images I saw in Dominika's Instagram feed.

Her Instagram is filled with images of Cibulkova looking impossibly glamorous in some very luxurious settings: wearing a diaphanous sheer pink dress at a charity ball, knee-high boots and a tight black mini dress at the front row of a fashion show, a billowy silk white gown for an ad campaign selling European diamonds. And even when she’s not dressing up for special events, Dominika is still giving us fashion and fantasy: whether it’s getting ready for date night with her hot hipster husband, or sensuously slinking out of a pool with the Dubai skyline in the background, Cibulkova shows us a world that is strangely yet irresistibly fabulous.

Granted, life through the lens of social media is rarely a completely accurate depiction of real life, for the famous and non-famous alike. Celebrities like Beyonce and Kylie Jenner have carefully “curated” Instagram feeds that are shaped by publicists, stylists, and other masters of illusion. But the beauty of Cibulkova’s Instagram feed is that, peppered in among the high-glamour fantasy images, there are pictures and videos of her practicing on the court where she’s sprinting, sweating, grunting, and clearly not concerned with how she looks. These are the times when she’s slogging through the routines of being a tennis player, when she’s stark and serious because she’s doing her job.

Cibulkova may be a girly-girl who loves fashion and beauty and sparkly things; she may even be a bit narcissistic for putting all these images out there for the public to consume and fawn over, but she’s clearly OK showing the world a different side of herself. It’s that ability to be fabulous and still let her guard down, to not have to be perfect at every turn, to speak her mind and not care too much what other people think -- for me, these things make Dominika Cibulkova someone whose career and life is definitely worth following.

All images are from Cibulkova's Instagram account.