In conversation with Roger Federer, on board his private jet
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In conversation with Roger Federer, on lath his private jet
The 20-time 1000 Slam champion and all-round squeamish guy believes that "You cannot just be solitary at the pinnacle. Y'all demand rivals", and is thankful towards his opponents for making him a improve actor.
Roger Federer. (Photo: AFP/Ben Stansall)
In 25 years of interviewing athletes, I've learnt that they never inquire you lot anything back. Roger Federer is the exception. In the van to his private jet, he bombards me with questions: How badly have the gilets jaunes smashed upwards Paris, where I live? Practice I have children? When he discovers I have twins (he has two sets, i female, one male), and that my female parent, like his, came from northern Johannesburg, he grins with delight: "We could exist like brothers." He speaks near-perfect English, with some of the singsong rhythm of his native Swiss-German language.
This forenoon we are flying his shared NetJets plane from Zurich to Madrid, where he'southward playing a tournament. We have off nigh vertically: Private jets wing at over 40,000 feet (12,200m), higher than commercial planes, and whizz through the thin and nigh traffic-gratuitous air.
Federer and I sit facing each other in soft beige leather armchairs. The stewardess unfolds a dining table between us. Our boyfriend passengers – 2 of Federer's fitness coaches and a NetJets man – loll on a sofa at the back of the cabin. I feel as if I'k in a magazine advertisement for commencement-course life. My tablemate, despite a slightly bulbous olfactory organ, is as beautiful every bit a Roman god. With his long legs slung over each other, he looks perfectly at ease in his body. He smiles and makes center contact with the confidence of a human being accepted to getting a good response from everybody he meets. Unlike many athletes, he doesn't need an amanuensis by his side to censor his speech.
Aged 37, Federer has been on the circuit playing uniquely gorgeous lawn tennis for 20 years. Pundits began predicting his retirement a decade agone, but he won some other Wimbledon in 2022 and the Australian Open final twelvemonth (his 20th Grand Slam tournament). He returned to Wimbledon concluding week ranking third in the world behind Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal, and seeded second past the tournament'southward organisers. He was aiming for a record ninth victory, only lost to Djokovic in the final on Sunday (Jul 14). He seems genuinely unsure when he will retire. On the plane this morning, he appears as vigorous as a grown-up can be.
I want to get him to review his life and career. But first the stewardess brings us mini-croissants and fruit skewers. I had wondered whether Federer would eat human nutrient; Djokovic likes his gluten-free and raw, when he deigns to eat at all. Merely Federer spreads marmalade on his croissant.
The stewardess suggests detox juices: "Morn energy!"
Federer smiled: "I never have, just allow me try one." She gives him three unlike juices. I order a cafe latte, he an espresso, and we both get muesli. This is turning out less Spartan than I'd feared.
"Really," I started, "y'all've had multiple careers. You had your rise; then unchallenged supremacy; then rivals go far — "
"I run across it the same style," he interrupted.
I connected: "Now you're battling your way back to the top."
Here he demurred. "It'southward really the skillful times now. It'southward like I'm on this tour, almost, and I can appreciate these moments. Non knowing what the end is, is too possibly nice." He says he savours every trip now, because he knows information technology may be his concluding visit to that city.
So how would he sum up his career?
"It's gone way too fast. I experience like I was a inferior yesterday."
The bourgeois male child from Basel (his parents worked for the Ciba-Geigy pharmaceutical visitor) left home at 14 to enter a tennis academy. "I cried when I was away. Every time I took a train, Dominicus night at six, I was as sad as could be, but it was my choice. You give upward your childhood a bit, simply I would probably practice it all over again."
At 15, he sabbatum practising his autograph on paper tablecloths in French restaurants. "In case I got famous. I was thinking, 'Hopefully one day I tin can win tournaments and be in the top 100. And who knows, mayhap play against one of those guys I've seen on TV.' I call up at 18 I broke the top 100, and yous're similar, 'wow, I can really be on the tour. I'm in the locker room with Andre Agassi and Pete Sampras. My god, it'due south so absurd.' "
The teenager'due south biggest challenge was off-courtroom life: "Doing the red carpets, meeting important people, looking at women, speaking to women, speaking to people who I couldn't place, it was difficult. I was a shy person. But I recall tennis helped me, really shaped me."
Anile 19, at the Sydney Olympics, he met his futurity wife Mirka Vavrinec, who was playing tennis for Switzerland. Months later, he finally won a tournament. He recalls the carefree lawn tennis of youth: "At 20, there's a great point, and you lot're like, 'This 1, I'chiliad going to crush and so hard, I'm really going to make a hole into the ground.' At 37 you're like, 'Hmm, I'thou probably going to start striking information technology there, and so manoeuvre the guy around, and somehow work my mode to the net and finish off with a nice volley.' " Nowadays, he said, he sometimes has to push himself to try "the crazy shots". He worries about becoming too canny, and tennis becoming besides professional person.
He has wolfed down everything except his fruit. I initially assume our breakfast is over, but the stewardess reappears to accept more orders.
"Could I peradventure have one more than espresso?" asked Federer, adding a very British, "Sorry."
She suggests an omelette.
"Why non?" said Federer. I concur, and remark on his ambition.
"I don't want to become too serious," he said. "Information technology also reminds me, maybe, I'one thousand more than than just a tennis player." Has he really eaten Kit Kats before major finals? "I'll have a coffee before every match, and if there is a chocolate on the side, I'll accept a chocolate. Or a cookie." Geniuses don't have to sacrifice like mortals.
Only Federer had to acquire to command his genius. I ask if he recognises parallels with some other natural: Lionel Messi. Federer, a football game fan, lights up. He asks excitedly if I've met Messi (he hasn't). "Funny enough," he said, "I haven't spoken about Messi nigh enough. What I dear almost Messi probably most is when he gets the ball and is able to turn the body towards goal, and so he has full vision. Then he'south going to laissez passer, or dribble, or shoot. There'southward ever three options for him. He's one of the few who's got that."
"Doing the red carpets, meeting important people, looking at women, speaking to women, speaking to people who I couldn't identify, it was hard. I was a shy person. But I recall tennis helped me, really shaped me." – Roger Federer
I notation the parallel: Federer, besides, has many choices. The tennis author and coach John Yandell once counted 20 variations of his forehand alone.
"Yes," nodded Federer. "The problem when you're younger is knowing to use what when. That is quite – how do you say? – complex. Whereas if y'all're a role player who's merely very good at doing forehands and backhands beyond court all day, it'south easier.
"I've got a lot of different options. For united states it's more challenging. I recall once you master the craft of knowing, 'Which club shall I take out of the bag for this shot or pass?', it's incredibly exciting. Maybe this is why my love for the game is so large present. Geometry, angles, when to striking which shot, should I serve and volley? Stay back? Should I chip and charge? Should I hit large?"
Once he mastered his options, he won his beginning Grand Slam tournament at Wimbledon in 2003. In January 2004 he added the Australian Open. Then, he said, "I took a conscious decision: I'd like to play for a long time." His fitness coach recommended frequent breaks rather than chasing every appearance fee.
"Yous could just power out and say, 'I'one thousand planning to play till 30,' like everybody else did, only I always thought it'd be and so much fun to play through generations. Because our generations are not x years, xv years. Every five years yous have somebody else. My generation, then Rafael, Novak and Andy [Murray]. Now yous have the next generation. I wanted to experience that, and also – it sounds stupid now – maybe requite younger guys an opportunity to play somebody sometime like me."
From 2004 through January 2010 he towered over men's tennis (except confronting Nadal on clay), winning 15 Grand Slam tournaments. In 2009 his twin daughters arrived. "For me, '10 and '11 are a mistiness, considering of the children. All I remember is moments with my family, not my results. I'm happy information technology'due south this mode."
But while Federer inverse nappies, Nadal and Djokovic matured and began beating him on all surfaces. Nadal'due south tape confronting Federer, after a xv-year rivalry, stands at 24-15, after this calendar month's straight-fix victory in the semi-finals of the French Open. Federer didn't win any 1000 Slam tournaments from 2022 through 2016. Given his age, nigh pundits assumed he was fading. He said, "Those were the fighting years for me. This is where I had to prove battle."
Would he have preferred unchallenged supremacy? "Of form. I would take loved to dominate forever. When Rafael and others were coming through, it took me some getting used to." He said of Nadal: "At i point yous tip your hat: You lot're very good. I take joy afterward realising: You cannot but be lone at the superlative. You need rivals. I'one thousand thankful to these guys, to make me a ameliorate player."
Federer and Nadal have prepare a tone of niceness in the locker room. In the 1980s, Jimmy Connors and John McEnroe sometimes didn't even speak to rivals and youngsters. Federer reports hearing that "in the 80s and 90s, a few guys actually could not stand each other".
Past the time he started on bout, things had improved. "It was a very friendly locker room already, so I guess I just maintained that. Something I care deeply about is that young guys are welcomed nicely on to the tour, and they realise, 'This is going to be fun, buddy, and, nosotros, the meridian guys, are cool.' "
So when a teenage rookie walks into the locker room, Federer goes upwardly and says hi?
"Yep. And so mayhap: 'You lot want to practice?' And in that do, you can chat: 'What's going on? Practise you lot have brothers or sisters? Who was your hero growing up?' "
I interjected: "But you were their hero."
"Not ever. Sometimes. That'due south always awkward, especially when it happened the beginning time."
In 2014, Federer's sons were born. I quoted the chess player Garry Kasparov, who told me over an FT Luncheon in 2003 that at 40, "You can't throw energy of nuclear size in the game. Because you have family, or kids, maybe businesses, you have other problems."
Federer enthusiastically interrupted: "I e'er feel like I'm wearing two watches, 1 on myself and one of the family, because I know their schedules inside out. I know when they're going to bed, when I'm at the lawn tennis. I know I can speedily FaceTime them before they go to bed, 45 minutes before I play.
"I come back [home] later winning a lucifer or tournament, or losing, and they're similar, 'Hey, tin can you play Lego with me?', and I'yard like, 'Let'southward do it.' Fine, I sometimes sit down there and my match is going through my mind, simply I am trying to give total attention to my son. I never saw in my vision, as a little boy, winning Wimbledon and and so going to play with my children. And then this is quite surreal."
His egalitarian fellow-Swiss permit him to exist a regular dad. "I can go to playgrounds with my kids. It's simply me speaking to other parents, like what y'all would be doing."
Don't some parents desire selfies?
"Yes, and that is normal. I have to make a decision when I walk out in the morning: Am I in the mood for it? If not, well, I have a pick to stay home. And I tin always be polite and say, 'I'm with my children right now. I'g trying to build a house in the forest or any, but I'm happy to practice it later.' "
"At one bespeak y'all tip your lid: You're very good. I take joy later realising: You lot cannot simply be alone at the top. You need rivals. I'chiliad thankful to these guys, to make me a ameliorate player." – Roger Federer
After his human knee functioning in 2016, many predicted retirement. But he has since added three more Grand Slam titles. "I believe I'chiliad at the height of my physical possibilities even so," he said. Though he takes more than breaks nowadays, information technology's not only to protect ageing bones. "You don't want to go through a career racing through everything, and recall, 'I was never enjoying my biggest moments.' " A while dorsum, he suggested to his married woman that they take time to relish his tournament wins. Instead of flying out at in one case, "Maybe we could exit the adjacent morning. Nosotros could have a dainty dinner, a drinking glass of champagne, arctic out."
Has he had a happy 20 years on tour? "Very."
Does he fear the void afterwards? "Not really. Having a foundation, having iv children, having some sponsors that are going to exceed my playing days, I think it will be fine." And he won't miss the stress, he added.
"I volition miss that other family: The players. I think that's what will be toughest. 1 twenty-four hour period, when you really leave, the question is, who are you still going to be in touch with? That'due south when you realise who your real friends are from the bout. You realise there's not many."
Who are they? His firsthand reply is touching: "I would think that I'm still in touch with Rafael."
After nearly two hours of well-nigh ceaseless conversation, we're descending into Madrid. Federer gestured at the arid fields below united states of america. "Europe is so much fun. Yous see, we're travelling just a little bit. The mural's already semi-burnt from the sun. In Switzerland, everything's but green. I dearest that about Europe." He tries to enjoy the cities he visits. He never wanted his travels to be "hotel, gild, aerodrome, run into you lot subsequently. We try to accept a hotel in the city heart, and so nosotros tin can go for a walk or get to a park. Nowadays, with the zoo, we see cities from a totally different angle with the kids. I like restaurants at dark, to decompress with my married woman and friends."
Federer claims to enjoy interviews. I asked what we journalists still don't get about him. That he'southward a jokester in private, he replied. And also: "Maybe they don't know I take a wine cellar, and I like to open a bottle with friends."
On the tarmac, the NetJets man snaps our picture. Federer throws an arm around me, and I put my paw on his back. Every other back I've touched felt similar a unmarried undefined mass. On Federer's dorsum you feel every bone and muscle. Information technology's similar reading an anatomy textbook in Braille.
Past Simon Kuper © 2022 The Financial Times
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