[3] Garros began a career in aviation in 1909 and performed many early feats such as the first-ever airplane crossing of the Mediterranean Sea in 1913.

He joined the French army and became one of the earliest fighter pilots during World War I. Garros was shot down and died on 5 October 1918.

[4] Roland Garros was born in Saint-Denis, Réunion, and studied at the Lycée Janson de Sailly and HEC Paris.

[7][8] During Garros’s summer holiday in 1909, at Sapicourt near Reims, staying with a friend's uncle, he saw the Grande Semaine d'Aviation de la Champagne which ran from 22 to 29 August.

[9] He started his aviation career in 1909 flying a Demoiselle (dragonfly) monoplane, an aircraft that flew well only if it had a small lightweight pilot.

[15] Reports published in August 1914 claimed Garros was involved in the "first air battle in world history" and that he had flown his plane into a Zeppelin, destroying the airship and killing its pilots and himself.

Raymond Saulnier had begun work on a synchroniser (which times the firing of the gun with the position of the propeller) before World War I and had taken out a patent for a workable mechanism by 14 April 1914.

However, circumstances beyond his control resulted in its being tested with the Hotchkiss 09/13 portative machine gun, which proved unsuitable due to an inconsistent firing rate.

[citation needed] On 5 October 1918, Garros was shot down and killed near Vouziers, Ardennes, a month before the end of the war and one day short of his 30th birthday.

[33][34] According to Vũ Trọng Phụng's urban novel, Dumb Luck (1936), during colonial times the Hanoi government named the city's main tennis stadium after Roland Garros.

[35] The French car manufacturer Peugeot commissioned a 'Roland Garros' limited edition version of its 205 model in celebration of the tennis tournament that bears his name.