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The champion mannequin requires monastic focus. Bjorn Borg, holed-up in an austere lodge room. Chris Evert, ordering room service night time after night time. Others we’ll politely exclude, who reveled in by no means studying a ebook, visiting a museum, seeing a play, listening to classical music, strolling right into a café.
Then there may be Stefanos Tsitsipas. “This can be a seeker,” analyst Jon Wertheim stated at the moment on Tennis Channel Dwell as he mentioned the Greek contender’s new Dear Fans vlog-umentary. Wertheim additionally famous how Tsitsipas enjoys watching the Historical past Channel.
Dare we name Tsitsipas a “Tennisance Man” for the 21st century? Do his introspective, studious qualities supply a brand new mannequin for a way an expert tennis participant can greatest savor his many travels and concurrently pursue his goals?
No query, Tsitsipas goes about his tennis fiercely, his matches crammed with ardour. Although solely 22, Tsitsipas has already performed his share of rollercoasters, together with a number of five-setters on the majors which have wrung him dry. This previous week in Melbourne had one which went the space, a second spherical match versus Thanasi Kokkinakis that noticed Tsitsipas drop the primary set, win the subsequent two, lose the fourth—and ultimately, after 4 hours and 32 minutes, shut it out, 6-4 within the fifth.
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“Nice match in direction of the very finish, and I fought like a lion,” stated Tsitsipas afterwards. “I fought like an actual warrior on the market, and it was an incredible ending with a lot of emotion and nice spirits.”
The intriguing dimension with Tsitsipas is that he’s doubtless hung out with lions, examine warriors, questioned his feelings, channeled spirits. Animals, literature, psychology, philosophy, vogue—these are just some of his many pursuits.
An open secret about life as an expert tennis participant is that there are various pockets of downtime. Tennis will not be soccer, the place the top coach creates a paramilitary atmosphere, nearly each minute of the week main as much as recreation day rigorously scheduled. As all tennis gamers present, it is a recreation for the independent-minded, for the free spirit unwilling to be plugged right into a boss’s org chart.
And now alongside comes Tsitsipas. Maybe his strategy defines one other option to deal with stress, much less as a actuality and extra as a fleeting phantasm. In spite of everything, amid a well being disaster that has introduced a lot of the world to a standstill, the lexicon of sports activities is unquestionably in for reform. Strain? Wins and losses that carry huge consequence? It’s laborious to take that sort of considering too critically. Higher but, Tsitsipas: tennis as a recreation—one which issues very a lot, however nonetheless, joyfully, merely a recreation, its yellow ball, circling across the larger ball generally known as Earth.
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