Novak Djokovic made history at Wimbledon on Sunday and could not have sounded less interested in it. His 106th match-win at the All England Club, a 7-6, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 defeat of qualifier Roman Safiullin, carried him past Roger Federer into sole possession of the record for the most men\u2019s singles wins in the tournament\u2019s history.<\/p>\n
Told of the milestone, he offered a shrug. \u201cNot on my priority list, to be honest,\u201d he said. \u201cI haven\u2019t thought about it. I didn\u2019t even know about it until after the last match win. That\u2019s really quite insignificant to me at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
The win was also Djokovic\u2019s 17th Wimbledon quarterfinal, second only to Federer, and his ninth in a row at the tournament. At 39, he became only the third man in the Open Era to reach the last eight here aged 39 or older, after Ken Rosewall and Federer himself (Wimbledon 2021). None of it, he insisted, was on his mind as he walked off court. What was on his mind was how little he had enjoyed the tennis that got him there.<\/p>\n
Djokovic \u201crelieved\u201d more than \u201chappy\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSatisfaction and enjoyment were not part of today\u2019s win, to be honest,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019m relieved and happy to win it, but I haven\u2019t enjoyed it. Hopefully the next match will be better in that sense.\u201d The problem, he was careful to note, was not his body. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t physical \u2013 physical was kind of okay. Just game-wise, I didn\u2019t enjoy my tennis,\u201d he said, handing the qualifier a share of the credit.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s also due to him putting a lot of pressure on me, playing well. I struggled to find the level I\u2019m looking for, the one I had in the second round particularly. But a win is a win, even if you win ugly. Hopefully I can build from this.\u201d<\/p>\n
For a player of his standards, accepting an ugly win is its own discipline. \u201cI\u2019m a perfectionist at core. I always want the best game, the best performance, for myself and for others and for the crowd,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not always possible, and sometimes it\u2019s hard for me to accept that and deal with it. It\u2019s always like that fresh off the court. You need to just move on, learn, and be better next time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Moderns science<\/p>\n
Asked to recall other majors where he had felt this flat and gone on to win the title, he smiled at his own fallibility. \u201cMy memory is not really good these days,\u201d he said. \u201cBut there have been more than a few where you go through a difficult match or two on the path to a championship.\u201d<\/p>\n
If the game comes and goes, the maintenance never stops \u2013 and, by his own admission, it has never been heavier. \u201cThe amount of time I spend recovering nowadays is more than I have ever done,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s the demands of the body, more swear and tear. I can\u2019t say I always enjoy it. It takes away a lot of time. But it\u2019s part of the process, an adjustment to the body changes of the late years.\u201d<\/p>\n
What follows is a tour of modern sports science. \u201cThroughout my career I\u2019ve always tried to look for what can give me an edge, the best recovery and wellness technology out there,\u201d he said. \u201cHyperbaric chambers, cryo chambers, cold immersions, red light therapy, pulse electromagnetic therapies. There are a lot of things I\u2019ve used and I\u2019m still using.\u201d Experience, though, has taught him restraint as much as accumulation. \u201cSometimes less is more. You just have to feel what really works for you.\u201d<\/p>\n
I enjoy the battle. I enjoy the suffering, in a sense, to some extent \u2013 even though I don\u2019t want it, I don\u2019t invite it<\/p>\n
The mind has been recalibrated to match. Where the object was once to dominate, now it is often simply to endure. \u201cI enjoy the battle. I enjoy the suffering, in a sense, to some extent \u2013 even though I don\u2019t want it, I don\u2019t invite it,\u201d he said. \u201cIf it happens, you just have to grind and look for a way to win. That\u2019s what I did again today, against another inspired opponent who played really high-level tennis. I\u2019m happy that I managed to find a way, because that\u2019s the end result I\u2019m always looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not every part of the grind is serene. Djokovic acknowledged the flashes of temper that still surface \u2013 a warning here, a muttered outburst there \u2013 and framed them without pretence. \u201cSometimes it helps to filter things that are building inside,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not something I\u2019m proud of when I get a warning and have a meltdown. It\u2019s not something I\u2019m looking for. But when it happens, it happens. You just try to eliminate it, not think about it too long, and move on to the next point and the next task at hand.\u201d<\/p>\n
There will be another test soon enough \u2013 a quarterfinal against the winner of Felix Auger-Aliassime and Alejandro Davidovich Fokina \u2013 and, should the fortnight keep breaking his way, the prizes that would genuinely move him: an eighth Wimbledon title to equal Federer, a 25th major to stand alone.<\/p>\n
Those are the numbers that still register. The one he set on Sunday, the one everyone else spent the evening celebrating, barely did. At 39, Djokovic has broken so much that records have become background noise. Only the trophy still pays him back \u2013 and, as he made plain, the past does not. \u201cQuite insignificant to me at the moment\u2026\u201d A 25th Grand Slam might be the only legitimate thing to consider.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Novak Djokovic made history at Wimbledon on Sunday and could not have sounded less interested in it. His…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":783749,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-783748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=783748"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783748\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/783749"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=783748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=783748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=783748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}