Interview Quotes

Iga Sviatek on Her Wimbledon Victory and Adjustments

"Well, I gotta say, when I was preparing for this podcast, I was wondering how I'm going to answer all these questions. Because on one hand, like, I want to tell you everything, you know? Because I also know you understand, and you probably saw everything anyway. But on the other hand, like, I don't want to put it out there. So, I'm going to try to balance it."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:20:04

"Well, basically, you know, with Wimbledon, I think I started serving better. Even at the beginning, like, after two months of practices, he kind of forced me to serve more on use to the T and on add to the backhand side. I didn't like this, you know, directions before, because I felt like it's the, like, I can't slice it even a bit. I should play this surf flat, you know? And I felt like it's kind of too risky for me."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:21:22

"Honestly, when I looked at the stats after the tournament, I literally told my conditioning coach, like, was the speed check, like, broken? Because I never served that fast, you know? I was serving faster than all the big servers that we have on WTA Tour."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:23:40

"And I got to say, for the first year, I wasn't trying to, like, copy my clay court game with still trying to spin the ball on the forehand and, I don't know, move kind of similar. I just wasn't really – I just knew that I need to use my intuition a bit more. I think I played more flat from the beginning of the grass court season. And, you know, my spin wasn't really working before because, okay, the bounce was still higher than when you play flat. But the girls had it literally on the right height, you know, to attack. So, I think I played more flat, more aggressive from the first shot."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:25:02

"Well, you're probably right, but I wouldn't say it's something new, because I always loved my backhand. And backhand down the line is my favorite shot, basically. So it's not like we focused on it. I would say that was probably third or fourth on the list in terms of importance on grass, you know."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:36:12

"So, um, so I kind of only think about these stats and these achievements when I get asked about it, but day by day, not really. It's, I try to remind myself if I feel like I need to, yeah, celebrate a bit more and, um, and be proud of what I'm doing."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:47:45

"But, uh, but this year I gotta say, um, and last year, cause I lost number one in like in September or October. So, um, it was a bit different cause I just had many different stuff to work on and to focus on, you know, it started with my case, um, and coming back after the case and all these mixed feelings that I had also, you know, playing well in Australia and then playing well in, in Doha."

— Iga Sviatek • 00:50:30

"And finally, yeah, when I lost in Rome pretty early and I for sure underperformed and my head wasn't in the match at all, like I couldn't focus. I, I had many, you know, thoughts about, I don't know, even, yeah, it was kind of, I, I made my own problems, you know?"

— Iga Sviatek • 00:56:30

"So, so yeah, I, I was a mess. Um, my, my team helped me a lot, uh, with making the process kind of logical. They told me basically, and the lawyer, what I needed to do. Uh, we started testing on my supplements and, um, and medicines that I, that I take."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:02:56

"Well, I wanted to explain it, but because people, I came back on the court and people did forgot that I had this kind of problem and they just thought that it's going to be back to normal, you know, back to winning everything. And honestly, I thought it as well at some point because I had this, I don't know, perfect Instagram kind of vision that, you know, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger and this kind of blah, blah, blah."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:10:33

"Um, but, but yeah, I felt like I should do more. I felt like, you know, the previous, I was constantly comparing myself to my previous seasons and, um, and that can't be helpful if I won almost everything, you know, uh, before."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:17:33

"So, um, so yeah, Wim is, Wim is great and he, he's a great coach. He, he knows a lot, he has amazing experience and he uses it, you know, um, to explain me stuff and to convince me sometimes."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:24:45

"Well, I wouldn't say I worked on it from a very young age. Because it's not like we had, it's not like I was in this system where I had the best coaches already from a young age. You know, my dad was basically just trying to figure things out."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:29:45

"And, um, yeah, but you know, I think, I don't know, I can't, I can't really tell you, you would have to talk to someone who knows some stuff about it. Cause, um, cause I just do that, you know, I just do what my, what magic basically tells me to do on our practices and I don't overthink it."

— Iga Sviatek • 01:31:04

Reflections on the Caseload and Career

"One of them was sort of the tick-tock of what happens when you have one of these adverse doping findings and you see the difficult position a player is in and she couldn't immediately run to defend herself because that would have, that would have violated the process."

— John • 00:44:15

"That was a, that was a really spirited conversation with someone who doesn't always engage in spirited conversations. I enjoyed that."

— John • 00:47:36

"Tennis is a cruel sport. You're, you're Davidovic Fikina. You beat Taylor Fritz and Ben Shelton. You're a point away from winning your first title. Oh, you are, you too are going to have a career high ranking after this likely. And then you just can't quite seal it."

— John • 01:00:35

"I don't think this was a huge surprise. This has been a relationship of less than a year. Naomi Osaka has won a fair amount of matches, but not at the biggest and best events."

— John • 01:05:23

"Bernie Venisevic is going to have a very—we're not quite a 30-for-30 level, but he could do quite a short about 2025 and his coaching misadventures."

— John • 01:08:32

"Man, we could do like half. I'm kind of sort of fascinated by this whole topic. And for a while, one of my takes on Wimbledon was how much money they passed up and they didn't get into the naming rights game and they didn't have so many sponsors and you don't see the back walls plastered."

— John • 01:11:40

"And the fact that the qualifying rounds will be on site will turn this into a three-week event the way the U.S. Open is."

— John • 01:14:49

"We had good Venus Williams discussion after talking about the merits of her wild card. I think that was validated."

— John • 01:17:39