Sometimes, players just need to let it all go

A TENNIS JOURNEY
Collins had places to go and no time for no BS

The sass is going to be missed. And it will also a major part of her legacy. As Danielle Collins showed again in Madrid by tearing apart someone in the crowd who dared to talk back - “You come out here and play!” is already a classic - there’s just nobody on the WTA Tour like her. The American is set to retire this year but, in the meantime, she’s seriously crushing it with a title in Miami, another in Charleston, a three-set loss against Aryna Sabalenka in Madrid’s third round, and another great run for now in Rome. She loves the clay, by the way: “You play some longer points on the clay, you have a bit more time, it’s softer on your body and you can think a bit more creatively, play with more variety in your game.”

The 2022 Australian Open finalist is as feisty on the court than determined off the court. Don’t come for her if you can’t handle the clapback. She’s not mean, she’s not rude: she just doesn’t have time for nonsense…and she loves to win. Battling health issues for years and not coming from money, she built her tennis persona to be iron-made. “I don’t take wins and losses personally”, she told us in Madrid after the second round. “I come out here to play for the enjoyment and love of the game, and to compete hard, to do my best. I’m a driven person, and I’m so focused on the task that I can’t get too ahead of myself: I have to be very locked into what I’m doing. It’s putting pieces together.”

Collins might sometimes make it look like she feels entitled to winning a match, but it’s not what her on-court energy means. She feels way more grateful than entitled about anything. “I’m really grateful for being a part of the highest-paid women’s sport. I don’t take this opportunity for granted by any means. I came not from much, I’ve worked really hard to get to this level and I’m grateful. Every time I step on the court I know that one bad accident in your life, one bad diagnosis, and life can change very quickly. A lot of these women on Tour haven’t come from a lot of financial opportunities and so it puts things into perspective.”

Collins never forgot where she was coming from: it’s drilled inside her head. “I didn’t have a passport until I was in my 20s, never been out of the country… So to be able to experience traveling the world when not a lot of people are able to do that, it has opened up a lot of opportunities. It’s been incredible.” Life has come full circle for her and you can see she’s been aiming at enjoying every single second of her career: she knows why she’s out there, she knows her worth and she knows she’s going to enjoy the exit. She has all the memories to show for it.

“A lot of people don’t get to make it to Australia because it’s such a far trip, no matter where you are in the world. But I’ve been able to spend so much time in Australia, a month at least out of the year, and to see so much of the year. As a kid, I did a project on Australian animals and nature - I still have it actually - so to be able to come full circle and actually go to Australia is incredible. Europe’s great too, I love to go to the Middle East… I thoroughly enjoyed everywhere I’ve been able to go. I went to China, Japan…” Collins often doesn’t finish her sentences, she throws you a look instead that speaks louder. It’s just that, again, she has places to go and you better catch up. #BlessHerSoul

Garcia might want to take a page off Collins's book

Watching Caroline Garcia losing again - we’re at 5-0 - by Danielle Collins in Rome, one might be thinking how funny a tennis path can be. Collins found her way by not caring about whatever anyone could say about her or her game. Garcia keeps losing it before finding it again and losing it again because she just can’t do the same. She said it many times: she struggles to own her very aggressive game while hearing people say she should keep the ball inside the court more, or be more solid, not going for this much all the time. Peer pressure to the max.

I talked to her coach, Bertrand Perret, in Madrid and he was clear about it: she needs to play the only way she’s outstanding and to stop thinking about results because that never ends well with her. To free her from all the doubts and frustration, Perret agreed with her that they needed to switch things up: more fun, and less stress.

“We changed a lot of things in the way the training is organized”, he explained. “I try to give her more free time and to avoid inflicting a crazy amount of pressure by making tennis the center of all things. If you spend all the year with your head in the game… We also try to bring more fun into the sessions. All of this is because, with her game, she mostly needs to be loose, to see the fun in playing. We need to step away a bit from the matches and the results. If she only thinks about the results, about not losing, and with the game she has: she gets stuck. She needs to let it go.”

Professional sport, but make it fun? Not an easy task… Perret agrees. “No, it’s not easy but it totally goes with the way she plays. She needs to remain positive, to have fun and to understand that yes she’s going to make mistakes but she needs to accept it and keep going. Caro feels the best when she’s aggressive: she frees herself this way. If she doesn’t, she moves backward and it’s worse. People who don’t know her say it’s enough to put the ball back in the court but that’s not at all how it works. She needs to keep playing her game and move forward. If she focuses on keeping the ball inside the court, she gets tight. Losses will always come: most players lose every week so you need to accept it and move on. If not, you have your head deep underwater and there’s no way to breathe. Sometimes, it’s fine to be a little less of a perfectionist.”

Caroline Garcia agrees: “It’s important to keep things light and to find the fun when you’re competing and things are tough. It’s been a rough year for me so we wanted to change some things: what motivates you at 20 isn’t the same as at 30 so yes I want to train but not to spend my whole day at it. We needed to try new things, to get out of the routine. I win or I lose but I need to go for it because it’s the only way for me to get these results.” A quarter-final in Miami, a semi-final in Rouen: Garcia is still far but not that far if through one tournament all decide to click. She found one more person to support her case recently as we’ve seen Ivan Ljubicic (who now works for the French federation) in her box. He even thinks she’s not aggressive enough!

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WHAT HAPPENS IN ROME… 
It’s all a mess, but will it matter in the end?

How to describe Novak Djokovic’s season so far? Sh.t happens, is the one thing that comes to mind. Don’t ask me what’s going on, because I don’t really know. Worst? I have a feeling that Novak doesn’t know either. The World No.1 has played four tournaments this year. Four. So when people are all going “omg Djokovic is going to arrive in Roland-Garros without having won a title”, I’m like: true, but also he has barely played so… We’re at four attempts for a title, so being 0/4 isn’t a very significant bad streak.

What’s significant is that even when he reached the semi-finals in Monte-Carlo, “Nole” didn’t look like Nole. The game is off. But is it off because there’s something wrong or because he doesn’t play enough to put in on? Another sure thing: he didn’t need to be hit on the head by a bottle in Rome. Like, are we living in a simulation now or something? Someone gone mad with the script? No idea who was on the court on Sunday to lose that match, but it couldn’t have been Djokovic even if it looked like it. The - once upon a time - unbreakable Djokovic will now undergo tests to see if there’s been a medical reason in Rome for whatever happened during that match.

It won’t change the fact that he’s now facing the prospect of landing at Roland-Garros with a preparation as messy as his confidence has to be now. Djokovic always needed a lot of time on the clay to peak in Paris so winning Roland-Garros right now seems an even bigger challenge than it has always been for him. He loves a mission impossible but still…

So yes, between the streak of injuries for the top players, the so-so situation of Rafael Nadal, and now this Djokovic mystery, it all looks like a mess. But we’ve seen in the past that once a Grand Slam starts, another book can be written. So even if we’re getting awfully close to seeing Roland-Garros turning into the Hunger Games, in the end we still might have business as usual.

A side note about Rome or more a memo: please stop expecting Rafael Nadal to win - you’re tiring me and more importantly you’re tiring him - and stay at expecting him to show up. And then at throwing a freaking scene to salute his exit: exhibit A.

So yes, Rafael Nadal lost against Hubert Hurkacz in Rome for his second match there because, of course, he was always going to lose that match. He barely beat Zizou Bergs in the first round. He has barely played this much tennis in two years. Hello! Nadal created a monster all these years, I know, but can we just please still act as if we have functioning brains? I’d be over the moon to see Nadal bring back the fire on clay one last time, but I’m already very happy to see him on the red at all. That’s where my expectations are at: seeing his name in the draw. Fingers and toes crossed for it to happen at Roland-Garros.

QUESTION OF THE DAY 
“It’s the true no?”

You were 57,14% to pick Wimbledon as the one Grand Slam you’d go to if you could only attend one. The AO came second, and the US Open third. My French heart bleeds as I have to say that Roland-Garros got no vote. Guys, that’s cruel 😆 

Aaaaaanyway, let’s switch things up for this week. It’s clay season and so it’s Rafa season whatever the results and so: throw your best Rafael Nadal on clay memories at me! Anecdotes, pictures if you have them, best matches that come to your mind, or just still haunt you: open your memory card to me 🙂 I will publish them throughout the rest of the clay season!

Send your answers, laughs and tears by either hitting the reply button or emailing this address: [email protected]

MENS SANA IN CORPORE SANO 
Injuries? “A much deeper conversation,” says Nadal

Rome has been plagued by top players’ injuries this year, with the worst news for the Italian fans coming from Jannik Sinner’s hip issues. It all started in Madrid when they began to drop like flies by the end of the tournament. So of course, we’re wondering if tennis is going through a spell of bad luck or if the sport is out to get its own athletes.

Asked about it in Rome, Rafael Nadal gave a very good answer that is maybe not the best news for where the Tour is at right now. But when you talk about injuries, the former World No.1 has the expert status. He started with a fact said in a very Nadal way of stating the obvious: “The injuries have been always there. That's the true. I understand that for you guys Jannik is not playing here is a terrible news, especially the way he's playing this year. But, I mean, we can talk about that for hours because at the end we have been talking about that for so many years. Now with Carlos and with Jannik not playing here, the conversation is on the table again.”

And he’s right in saying it’s been an ongoing issue on Tour: we’ve lost so many players through the years due to career-ending injuries, and we’ve kept track of all the broken limbs from Nadal to Alcaraz. The intensity of that sport has kept growing, the schedule isn’t getting shorter and every match is a battle: so even if there’s never been more science behind players’ health and injury-prevention strategies, it might not be able to compensate for the rise in the demands on the bodies. In Madrid and Rome, it could be just bad luck that it broke Sinner (hip injury), Alcaraz (arm injury), and Lehecka (back stress fracture) at the same time, while nearly breaking Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev. The thing also is that we’re not dealing with short-term or let’s say less worrying injuries: Jiri Lehecka broke a part of his spine, like Bianca Andreescu last year.

That’s why Rafa makes a very important point when he asks to look at the bigger picture. “So the conversation is a much deeper conversation that today the three best players of the world are not able to play in Rome. If we want to talk about why people get injured, I tell you very clearly: when you push your body to the limit, you get injured at the end. When the game is faster and faster and faster, you get injured. When you play most of the year on hard courts and the surfaces are tougher for the body, you get injured. That's the simple answer. Then it’s about the tournaments, it’s about the business, about the sport itself. That's another conversation. In the end, the players want to make money, the tournaments want to make money. Then it's the cycle that comes together. We accept that role. Things happen. You don't have to tell me about injuries, that I missed a lot of very important tournaments in my career because of the injuries. You cannot complain about that. You accept what's going on. You keep going. You get injured, you have to recover well.”

Wanna stop time? Exercise.

Yes, you can slow down the time. I mean, are we about to find out how to Benjamin Button this thing? Maybe not, but also maybe a little? Mostly in your mind, but that’s already something… Scientists (psychologists from the UK and the Netherlands) have confirmed that exercise was slowing down the perception of time. Half a minute on a bike seemed 8 times longer than at rest. Also, no need to go crazy on that workout session because they say “It is exercise per se that significantly distorts time perception, not the intensity of exercise.”

That wrist injury always meant curtains for Thiem

The moment that right wrist injury hit, Dominic Thiem’s career was over. Same with Magnus Norman’s hip giving up back in the day, or even with Joachim Johansson’s shoulder (good lord, “Pim-pim”: remember him?!"). Sometimes, one big injury is enough, unfortunately. Thiem tried but 2024 will be the last year of his career.

For Thiem, who built his career on that wrist with that massive spin on the forehand and the backhand, there was no coming back to the top with a hampered hand. We could see it when he came back: that whip of a forehand that would have taken down trees in the forest had disappeared. “Domi” never got that Roland-Garros trophy that he surely would have claimed multiple times in any other era, but he at least got the 2020 US Open title. If you speak the language, you can watch him here in discussion with his brother and his father, about his tennis journey.

A very nice and down-to-earth guy, Thiem might also become a cautionary tale for the greater good of the other players: the Austrian inflicted himself a draining schedule year in and year out and was also relentless at practice. Many times we wondered the toll it would take on him, or if he was just made of steel. He seems at peace with it all now and it’s the most important thing.

BUSINESS / MEDIA 
Gauff hits back at Vogue cover’s criticism

Coco Gauff didn’t deserve that. All at her joy and pride of gracing the cover of Vogue in April, the young American - who also got the cover of Time last month - didn’t mince her words when someone tried to rain on her parade. During the “Cutting Room Floor” podcast, host Recho Omondi showed her dislike for the recent shoots made by Vogue and the star photographer Annie Leibovitz with Gauff. “Coco is a no…”, she started which wasn’t a good omen. Omondi was making a point about how she doesn’t like how Leibovitz works with Black women.

The issue is that it then collided with Gauff, just 20, seeing something she was proud of being talked down about. Gauff saw the big picture but used her social media to hit back at how it was presented: “I understand your take but when criticizing please consider the people in the cover's feelings," Gauff wrote. "To say it wasn't beautiful is a tad bit mean, just say you felt it could be captured better. I felt beautiful at first and after all the conversations I cried and felt like it wasn't beautiful. I know I'm not a model or the prettiest but just keep in mind the word usage when criticizing. I know in the end you're trying to advocate for better but I think there's a way to do that without commenting on the beauty of the picture. Comment on the lighting, angle unflattering angle, etc."

Omondi later answered Gauff to clarify what she meant. "You are gorgeous. No questions asked. I was speaking directly to how it was shot. It was more of a critique of how the images are shot but not the subjects themselves! We love you”. Yep, she surely should have started by that during the podcast. This is also revealing of the complicated journey of one’s body image seen through the lens of today’s media and social media, as it’s quite heartbreaking to read Gauff saying she doesn’t feel “the prettiest” and that one single comment erased how “beautiful” she felt about the shoot and had her in tears.

This whole thing also comes to show that going mainstream isn’t without risks for an athlete’s mental health: you might crave the exposure, you might feel you deserve to be a star but then you open the door to another world of judgment and different agenda. As if the tennis one wasn’t enough!

• Lifetime fitness partners with Lululemon. If you happen to be a tennis or pickleball member at a Lifetime fitness club in North America, you can now also do your Lululemon shopping there. While you also wait for a chance to cross Andre Agassi on the court as he’s been appointed as “the inaugural chairman of the company’s newly formed pickleball and tennis board”. The upscale company has indeed partnered with the clothing brand, which is sponsoring Canadian tennis player Leylah Fernandez, as an official apparel partner.

• “I didn’t want to be one of 50 Nike guys,” Shelton told The Athletic. The Athletic sat down with American’s tennis young star Ben Shelton and he explained why the only path he wants to take is the one the less traveled.

EDITOR’S PICKS 

• WATCH: An Irish village… Old murders… Podcast… We here. Have a go at Bodkin on Netflix.

• LISTEN TO: Are you a writer? If yes, you’ll love this podcast that goes deep into what happens backstage. The Shit No One Tells You About Writing, by Bianca Marais, Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra.

• READ: Before being the new “you need to watch this” movie, it was a book, and the word is that it’s even better on the page.

• Quiet on set! Ear plugs with three volume modes that are controlled by a single switch. You can decide to engage or to protect your ears during concerts or sporting events. Stay in the Loop.

• I never hop into a long flight without compression socks on. And when you can do it in style, why hesitate?
  
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