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Emma Raducanu posts cryptic message and selfie from inside £125k 911 Carrera GTS after Porsche took back supercar

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Emma Raducanu is back in a Porsche.  The 21-year-old has posted six pictures on her Instagram feed – including a selfie in what appears to be a Porsche 911 Carrera GTS.  It is not known when the picture was taken and it was posted with a cryptic printed message that read: ‘Like I vanished and reappeared’.  The posts came after it emerged that Porsche – who pay Emma as an ambassador – apparently recently ‘took back’ a £125,000 supercar they had let her borrow.

Miss Raducanu’s agent has been asked to comment.  Emma, who is currently injured and visited Great Ormond Street Hospital yesterday, fell in love with Porsche as a child because one of her first tennis coaches owned one of its sports cars.  Before her US Open success, she reportedly drove a £5,000 Dacia Sandero.

postcard The 911 shot was posted with a cryptic printed message that read: ‘Like I vanished and reappeared’.

emma in car Tennis star Emma Raducanu pictured arriving to practice in a £150,000 Porsche

‘Whenever I would turn up to practice in the morning I would see his Porsche,’ she said. ‘I would go, ‘Wow!’ and be dreaming of one day sitting in my own.’  So the grammar school girl couldn’t contain her excitement when she was appointed as a ‘global brand ambassador’ for the German marque after her fairy-tale victory in the US Open single’s final in 2021 at the age of 18. The endorsement deal was said to be worth a huge sum.

She was pictured looking proud – and a little nervous – as she drove to the National Tennis Centre in Roehampton, south-west London, in a £125,000 911 Carrera GTS Cabriolet, with a top speed of 192mph.  A week ago the Daily Mail’s Richard Eden revealed that the deal could be heading for the scrapyard.  ‘Emma no longer has a Porsche,’ one of her associates said. ‘They took it back. It used to have pride of place at her home.’

A Porsche spokesman confirmed that she is no longer in possession of one of its vehicles.  ‘While we do on occasion loan Emma a car, this is very much on an ad hoc basis,’ he said.  A source who works in the sponsorship business said that Porsche is known for the swiftness with which it withdraws its vehicles from celebrity ambassadors if it does not feel that it is achieving value for money.

Raducanu certainly put in some effort for the company, appearing in promotional videos including one in which she drove a 911 GT3 at Brands Hatch in Kent, and another where she did laps with Formula 1 veteran Mark Webber in a 911 Carrera S at Silverstone in Northamptonshire.  After becoming the first qualifier to win a Grand Slam title at the 2021 US Open, Raducanu, whose parents work in finance, signed highly lucrative deals with companies including Dior, Evian, HSBC and Vodafone.

Her company, Harbour 6 Ltd, recorded a profit of £9.6million last year.  However, she made clear in an interview that owning such an enviable set of wheels hadn’t gone to her head. ‘I’m not just Emma Raducanu who arrives in a Porsche, wears Dior and flies first class,’ she said.  The player, 21, was, however, unable to regain the form that saw her win the US Open. She has suffered a series of injuries, which have required her to undergo three operations.

Kieron Vorster, former strength and conditioning coach to players such as former British No1 Tim Henman, recently said Emma, ‘just doesn’t play enough matches’.  The Porsche spokesman insisted last week that she remains in her role.  ‘Emma Raducanu is a global brand ambassador for Porsche and there have not been any changes within our successful partnership since it started in 2022,’ he says. ‘We are very happy with our partnership.’

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