It's all about to hit the fan

LIVE FROM MADRID - ATP
Nadal will cry later, right now he has places to go

Nearly every single soul was crying inside la Caja Magica when Rafael Nadal lost. Not because he lost, but because it was real this time: he would never come back and play in Madrid. And he was one more step closer to the end of his extraordinary career. There’s a lot of denial involved in this whole “Nadal’s last tango” situation. We know he’s retiring from the game this year but somehow we’re blocking that out. Until he hits that last ball and says goodbye. Then it hits again. (You can watch the post-match tribute there). It hits in Barcelona, it hits hard in Madrid and we all know it will hit like wow in Roland-Garros if Nadal decides he can get there. We all know the movie's end, yet we don’t feel ready for it: for the nostalgia and the reality of the present day.

Yet Nadal is doing all he can to stop the time: he reached the fourth round in Madrid and was very convincing again on Wednesday throughout his loss against Jiri Lehecka (6-4, 7-5). He arrived in Madrid not even sure he’d be fit to play but he now left it having played multiple matches, including two back-to-back, without apparently too many physical issues. Again, we’re not at “Oh great he might be able to win Roland-Garros again” here, we’re still at “Oh great, he might be able to play Rome and Roland-Garros after all”. And so that’s why despite everybody around him trying, Nadal has still not shed a tear: he will not let go until that final point. As he said: “I didn’t want to deliver a sea of tears just because I’ve not finished my journey with racquet in hand. It was a very emotional night – more you could not (imagine). But it’s not the moment to release it all now when it comes to emotions and feelings. I still have miles to cover and I don’t want to release all the adrenaline.” Bend it like Rafa: keep it together, people.

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Sinner and Alcaraz, broken young bodies in Madrid

In an unfortunate turn of events, the players representing the change of the guard didn’t do much better than Nadal in Madrid.

Jannik Sinner, who looks on track to battle for the World No.1, is starting to feel the consequences of how many matches he won this year. He began to have hip pain early in the tournament, and decided to play through it in the third and fourth rounds but, in the end, reason prevailed and he withdrew on the eve of facing Felix Auger-Aliassime in the quarter-finals.

Carlos Alcaraz, still nursing that forearm injury that has delayed the start of his clay season, lost in the quarter-finals against Andrey Rublev (4-6, 6-3, 6-2).

When I asked him if he was finally able to hit that forehand normally or if it was still a work in progress, he didn’t hide his current struggles. “Well, I have to keep going. Right now here in Madrid, while every time that I'm hitting the forehand, I'm thinking about the forearm, if I'm getting a feeling or not. I have to work hard these days if I want to go to Rome with good feelings, without pain, without thinking about my forearm, but it's gonna be a slow process, I guess. I have to be patient in that way. Right now I leave Madrid with good feelings in my forearm, but I have to do good work.”

LIVE FROM MADRID - WTA 
Gauff wants her serve back, Swiatek chases a Taylor Swift ticket

• Coco Gauff is fighting her serve again and it cost her that fourth round against Madison Keys in Madrid (7-6(4), 4-6, 6-4). But the World No.3 was still focusing on the bigger picture after that disappointing loss.
  
  “My serve is evolving and there are a lot of minor changes being made so it’s difficult. I felt like the match was on my racquet a lot of times. I just can’t get broken back-to-back, it’s not acceptable. But it’s definitely something I have to go through. I’ve had this problem before and I think I can fix it and that it’s more mental than anything. It’s better than last week but it’s not the level where I want to be. It sucks I can’t play my best tennis but I can also be optimistic about playing bad and still getting close in these matches. It’s hard but I’ve learnt to start to see the positive: it wasn’t the worst tennis as, from the baseline, it’s probably the best I’ve played since Indian Wells.”

  
  Gauff also clarified where her main coach Brad Gilbert was. He was supposed to be in Madrid but had “something with his teeth” to solve, and so he will now be back in Rome next week. So, overall, Gauff is still on track with her plan for tennis domination. “I’d rather peak at the Slams than anywhere else but I do wanna do better consistently on Tour and in the 1000s especially. If you want to get to No.1, which is not a huge goal right now, eventually you have to win these tournaments. And when you’re consistently winning these tournaments, you do feel more confident going into a Grand Slam.”
  
  

• Anyone got a ticket for Iga Swiatek? The World No.1 has a lot of things on her plate between Madrid, Rome, Roland-Garros, and being a business boss, but she also has another stressful task on her hands: sneaking a ticket for a Taylor Swift show.

Asked about it in press conference, she directly looked at her agent to see if there had been good news while she was playing. There was none. “He's IMG agent so he should get it, I guess. But it's hard with the schedule. I think there is one show that is going to be perfect, but I think the tickets were already sold out.” The agent told her that actually it wasn’t, and you should have seen her face! “Not yet? So I can just buy them? Well, then what's the problem? (Laughter.) Okay. I'll get to it. Honestly, I didn't check before. So thanks for the reminder.”

QUESTION OF THE DAY
To Go Or Not To Go?

BUSINESS / MEDIA 
Tennis Australia goes after the ATP, while Serena and Venus take Paris

• The Athletic reports that things are escalating between Tennis Australia and the ATP over the potential Masters 1000 attributed to Saudi Arabia. “The owners of the Australian Open have notified the leadership of the men’s tour that they would consider any attempt to schedule a tournament in Saudi Arabia during the first week of the season as a request for a potential “breach” of an existing contract between the two organizations”, reports the Athletic.
  
  A letter has been sent for what is seen by Tennis Australia as a threat to their United Cup event which runs through an agreement with the ATP and the WTA until 2029. “We do not enter agreements lightly and neither do we take lightly being asked to breach an existing agreement”, wrote Jayne Hrdlicka and Craig Tiley, the chair and chief executive of Tennis Australia. As the situation is heating up, the ATP had to put out a statement about how nothing had been decided regarding the new Masters 1000 to sneak into the calendar. Everybody is currently walking on eggshells.
  
  

  

  
  

• You won’t see Serena Williams on the courts of Roland-Garros this year, but you might still be able to catch her, and also Venus Williams, at the VivaTech stage from 22 to 25 May in Paris at Porte de Versailles. VivaTech is Europe’s biggest technology and startup event. “It's their involvement alongside startup Shares that brings them to speak at Europe's biggest startup and tech event. Venus and Serena will be speaking in le Dôme de Paris on 24th May along with Benjamin Chemla, CEO of Shares, an investment platform”, says a press release. It’s going to be a busy spring for Venus Williams as she will host, from June 26, a six-episode podcast series as an initiative, Widening the Lens, from the Carnegie Museum of Art.

• Talking about Tennis Australia, the applications are open for the AO startups, the program “that enables startup companies to pilot their cutting-edge technology during the Australian summer of tennis and within Tennis Australia’s business”. 20 companies have already joined that program. Interested in it? You can shoot your shot there.

•  Naomi Osaka, film festival judge? Yes, she can. The Japanese player will join LeBron James and Joel Embiid to sit on this year’s Uninterrupted Film Festival Committee which will also be put on in partnership with Tribeca festival. Osaka is also set to figure in the new Beats Solo campaign, joining Angel Reese and Sha’Carri Richardson.

• WTA’s private equity partner made a splash with its IPO. CVC Capital Partners, owner of 20% of WTA’s commercial venture (for $150 million), had quite the blast on its Amsterdam debut with a valuation of $14 billion. In 2023, CVC reported $1.2 billion in revenue.

MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO 
Djokovic switches things up again

At this point, Novak Djokovic should run a whole HR department. After parting ways with his longtime business associates Edoardo Artaldi and Elena Cappellaro at the end of last season, and then announcing this year in March that he was no longer working with coach Goran Ivanisevic, the World No.1 has now let go of his fitness coach Marco Panichi.

Toe yoga, anyone? You say Djokovic, we think Avengers-like flexibility and so stretching and so…yoga. But do you know about toe yoga? Well, I did not until I fell on that article from Verywellhealth in the Nice News newsletter. “Experts say performing toe yoga can help improve balance, flexibility, and posture, and prevent injuries like plantar fasciitis by keeping the foot flexible.”

EDITOR’S PICKS 
Ratatouille would be so proud

• Ratatouille had a dream, and now it’s a reality. Disney World resort earned its first-ever Michel star, yes for real. Victoria & Albert’s restaurant, at the theme park’s Grand Floridian Resort, clinched that star last week. Micket Mouse but make it fancy dining? Apparently.

• You loved these two, so I’m bringing them back to you: that travel pouch that will make sure you don’t lose your passport, your wallet, your boarding pass, or all of the above, and that Samsonite Duffel bag in The Tennis Sweet Spot favorite color.

• Watch: Have you finished the third and last season of Young Royals yet? What, you haven’t even started? Guys… It’s even worth it just for the soundtrack in case you don’t care about rebellious royals (but, like, who wouldn’t?!)

• Listen to: Lindsay Davenport telling Andy Roddick "you were such a d*** about it!” for one big tennis laugh on the Served with Andy Roddick podcast.

• Read: Brad Gilbert has been in the Hollywood news lately because of his coaching of Zendaya for the Challengers movie, so it’s for sure the right timing for you to read (or read again) his Winning Ugly book turned tennis-cult-classic.