Roger Federer of Switzerland celebrates after defeating Denis Istomin of Uzbekistan at the Swiss Indoors ATP tennis tournament in Basel October 23, 2014. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann
The 17-time Grand Slam champion Roger Federer is the highest-paid tennis athlete inside the top ten with $56.2 million. He received $52 million from his endorsements with Nike, Rolex, Lindt chocolate, Credit Suisse, Moet & Chandon, Gillette, and more. According to Forbes, Federer gets paid $40 million by his sponsors every year. REUTERS

Roger Federer remains one of the top players in men’s tennis despite being on the tour’s veterans. In a recent interview, the Swiss Master dropped some names of all-time greats in different sports, whom he described as “big inspiration”.

"Once I reached a certain level. I looked up to the great other athletes out there, like Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Valentino Rossi and Michael Schumacher, people who did it so long, so many times and make you wonder 'How did they do that?” Federer said via Tennis Tonic ”Next thing you know. it's like you're part of that in a small way, and every year that goes by you get closer to those people. They were definitely a big inspiration for me to keep working hard."

All four players mentioned are considered an all-time great in their respective sports. Jordan is inarguable the best player of all time in the sport of basketball winning six championships with the Chicago Bulls in the National Basketball Association. Michael Schumacher has ruled the world of F1 Racing during his prime, Tiger Woods did the same in golf and Rossi has won MotoGP World Champion.

Federer’s greatness in tennis is also unquestioned. The Swiss has won Grand Slam tournaments 17 times in his career with wins at the Australian Open (2004, 2006, 2007 and 2010), French Open (2009), Wimbledon Championships (2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009 and 2012) and the US Open ( (2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008). Moreover, Federer has proven that he is not over-the-hill yet earning enough points in the 2014 season to grab the year-end World No. 2 ranking from rival Rafael Nadal.

Federer made a Grand Slam final at Wimbledon finishing second to Novak Djokovic in the tennis major in London, United Kingdom. He also finished the season on a high after winning the Davis Cup title for Switzerland for the first time in the country’s history.

Federer wants to prove that he’s far from past his prime as well and is preparing for the 2015 ATP season. The Swiss has signed up to play at the 2015 Brisbane International, a warm-up tournament for the 2015 Australian Open.

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