Winner Sinner
Hall of Fame
When it comes to tennis players and non-trivial people, Jack Draper fits right into this category. The British left-hander exploded in 2024, finally exploiting his potential: first career victory, on grass in Stuttgart, then the semifinal at the US Open, where only a formidable Jannik Sinner stopped his rise, and second title in Vienna. Powerful, complete, he can take the point from any position and has the rare ability to make the opponent play “badly” and then punish him suddenly with a sudden change, all this and much more is Draper, also a fragile physique that has forced him to take long breaks too many times. Currently, for a change, he is struggling with physiotherapy and rehabilitation: a sore hip and no winter training session with Alcaraz, as planned months ago. He will be at the Australian Open, but who knows in what conditions. The feeling is that when Jack shows up on the court in full health he is already a tennis player who is well worth the top 10, ready to fight for the big trophies. Draper gave a long and interesting interview to his colleague Simon Briggs of the Telegraph, in which he speaks openly about his priorities, and how despite tennis having always been his home environment (his father Roger was executive director of the LTA, the British Tennis Federation) his interests are varied. He suffers a lot from the condition of his grandmother Brenda, his first real coach, who suffers from Alzheimer's, so much so that supporting the fight against this disease has become one of his priorities. Here are some of the most significant passages of his thoughts expressed in the interview.
"You look at that person you love, and you realize that they no longer understand who you are or what is happening to them," says Draper speaking of grandmother Brenda. "There are many stages of Alzheimer's. At the beginning, you don't think properly and you lose your memory. Then the worst phase is when you are physically able, but you can’t do things anymore. I’ve seen her go through many different phases, like not wanting to get in the shower. ‘How do you get this strong woman to get in the shower every day?’ It’s impossible. And so you are proud of people like my grandfather, he is a real hero for how he continues to do what he is doing”. Right after the interview with the British media, Jack took part in the “walk of memory” along the Thames, in support of the Alzheimer’s Society, an event attended by the director general of the LTA Scott Lloyd and a wide range of coaches, journalists and family members. Financial and moral support, of presence, that of Draper, who lives this terrible disease in the family.
Jack tells how his lifestyle has changed radically, focusing more and more on tennis. “When I was a little younger, I just liked to work out a little bit, come home and eat chips and watch TV all day… Now that I feel like I have a bigger goal and purpose than myself, I want to be fully engaged in what I do. I want to progress. That’s all I really think about. When I have days off, I go through periods of being injured or not being able to play and going to the gym, it’s incredibly difficult. Now I’ve started to understand why Andy [Murray] had such a hard time quitting the sport. Tennis players are weird, we’re kind of chasing something all the time, we’re on that dopamine rush of playing and traveling to win. It’s not real life. So when you go back to not having a million things going on, you feel a little lost, like, how do I get through the day? What do I do? Watch a little TV? And then what?”
Draper thinks something clicked after the clay-court season last spring. With Wayne Ferreira by his side, he thought he would improve many things, starting with his serve. Things didn’t go at all as he hoped, with the terrible defeat he suffered at Roland Garros against Jesper de Jong, no. 176 in the world. It was like a slap in the face… so much so that as soon as he started working again with his trusted coach James Trotman, the light bulb went on. “At that moment I felt like I was out of control. I was like, ‘I have to get myself together. What am I doing? I’m not fulfilling my potential. I’m not the player I want to be.’ So, when I look back on this year, that’s the thing that gives me the most satisfaction, even more than the ride at the US Open. It’s being able to resolve certain situations and transform myself into a different player thanks to the change in mentality. During those two weeks, which started with training on the grass at Wimbledon and continued until the triumph in Stuttgart, I really changed”.
The work with Ferreira, which ended after the grass-court season, paid off in the summer. “Wayne wanted me to try to be more courageous, to play tennis that pushes right from the start. I guess I needed that, but at the same time I had to figure out what kind of player I was. I’m not a John Isner, one of my main attributes is that I move well for my size, that I can put a few more balls back, because that’s how I won matches when I was younger, when I was little. I had to see for myself that it wasn’t going to be a radical, big change. It was just maybe a five or 10 percent change in my tennis, it was moving up the court a little more, or taking a few more risks on returns, or hitting a few more serve-and-volleys, and just trying to create more presence around my game and not be so samey. I had to change, but I didn’t have to change a lot. I just had to figure out when to push and when not to.” It may seem like little, but it was everything for him: finally understanding how to use his means, his qualities. From then on, everything took off.
“What works for me is to come to practice every day and try to understand what I need to do better to be able to compete at my best in the big tournaments, to get to the big days of the tournaments and compete with the top players, mentally, emotionally, physically, everything. I think I’m ready mentally, I feel like I have the right personality to do it. I’m not going to go into my shell, I’m not going to sit in my living room every day thinking ‘I’m the British No. 1, what does that mean?’. I’m focused on getting better. And whether a good result comes in Australia, or if it’s in the middle of the year, at Wimbledon, we’ll see. The main thing is to feel like I’m getting better all the time. And yes, I hope I can be one of the best players in the world.”
Closing down for the off-court, Jack says he’s a very simple guy, who doesn’t think too much about money and material things. “I’ve earned good money this year, that’s true, but I’m still driving a second-hand Polo… I’m not materialistic. I don’t think of myself or what I do as something impressive.”
From tons of French fries to that continuous adrenaline rush that leads Draper to eat “bread and tennis,” never staying still and thinking almost obsessively about how to win. Yes, in the head of the British player something really seems to have clicked, that little magic that makes an athlete a potential champion.
"You look at that person you love, and you realize that they no longer understand who you are or what is happening to them," says Draper speaking of grandmother Brenda. "There are many stages of Alzheimer's. At the beginning, you don't think properly and you lose your memory. Then the worst phase is when you are physically able, but you can’t do things anymore. I’ve seen her go through many different phases, like not wanting to get in the shower. ‘How do you get this strong woman to get in the shower every day?’ It’s impossible. And so you are proud of people like my grandfather, he is a real hero for how he continues to do what he is doing”. Right after the interview with the British media, Jack took part in the “walk of memory” along the Thames, in support of the Alzheimer’s Society, an event attended by the director general of the LTA Scott Lloyd and a wide range of coaches, journalists and family members. Financial and moral support, of presence, that of Draper, who lives this terrible disease in the family.
Jack tells how his lifestyle has changed radically, focusing more and more on tennis. “When I was a little younger, I just liked to work out a little bit, come home and eat chips and watch TV all day… Now that I feel like I have a bigger goal and purpose than myself, I want to be fully engaged in what I do. I want to progress. That’s all I really think about. When I have days off, I go through periods of being injured or not being able to play and going to the gym, it’s incredibly difficult. Now I’ve started to understand why Andy [Murray] had such a hard time quitting the sport. Tennis players are weird, we’re kind of chasing something all the time, we’re on that dopamine rush of playing and traveling to win. It’s not real life. So when you go back to not having a million things going on, you feel a little lost, like, how do I get through the day? What do I do? Watch a little TV? And then what?”
Draper thinks something clicked after the clay-court season last spring. With Wayne Ferreira by his side, he thought he would improve many things, starting with his serve. Things didn’t go at all as he hoped, with the terrible defeat he suffered at Roland Garros against Jesper de Jong, no. 176 in the world. It was like a slap in the face… so much so that as soon as he started working again with his trusted coach James Trotman, the light bulb went on. “At that moment I felt like I was out of control. I was like, ‘I have to get myself together. What am I doing? I’m not fulfilling my potential. I’m not the player I want to be.’ So, when I look back on this year, that’s the thing that gives me the most satisfaction, even more than the ride at the US Open. It’s being able to resolve certain situations and transform myself into a different player thanks to the change in mentality. During those two weeks, which started with training on the grass at Wimbledon and continued until the triumph in Stuttgart, I really changed”.
The work with Ferreira, which ended after the grass-court season, paid off in the summer. “Wayne wanted me to try to be more courageous, to play tennis that pushes right from the start. I guess I needed that, but at the same time I had to figure out what kind of player I was. I’m not a John Isner, one of my main attributes is that I move well for my size, that I can put a few more balls back, because that’s how I won matches when I was younger, when I was little. I had to see for myself that it wasn’t going to be a radical, big change. It was just maybe a five or 10 percent change in my tennis, it was moving up the court a little more, or taking a few more risks on returns, or hitting a few more serve-and-volleys, and just trying to create more presence around my game and not be so samey. I had to change, but I didn’t have to change a lot. I just had to figure out when to push and when not to.” It may seem like little, but it was everything for him: finally understanding how to use his means, his qualities. From then on, everything took off.
“What works for me is to come to practice every day and try to understand what I need to do better to be able to compete at my best in the big tournaments, to get to the big days of the tournaments and compete with the top players, mentally, emotionally, physically, everything. I think I’m ready mentally, I feel like I have the right personality to do it. I’m not going to go into my shell, I’m not going to sit in my living room every day thinking ‘I’m the British No. 1, what does that mean?’. I’m focused on getting better. And whether a good result comes in Australia, or if it’s in the middle of the year, at Wimbledon, we’ll see. The main thing is to feel like I’m getting better all the time. And yes, I hope I can be one of the best players in the world.”
Closing down for the off-court, Jack says he’s a very simple guy, who doesn’t think too much about money and material things. “I’ve earned good money this year, that’s true, but I’m still driving a second-hand Polo… I’m not materialistic. I don’t think of myself or what I do as something impressive.”
From tons of French fries to that continuous adrenaline rush that leads Draper to eat “bread and tennis,” never staying still and thinking almost obsessively about how to win. Yes, in the head of the British player something really seems to have clicked, that little magic that makes an athlete a potential champion.
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