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Saturday, May 21, 2005
Tennis: Federer stays grounded as he thinks of clay
By Christopher Clarey, International Herald Tribune
PARIS This is Roger Federer's moment, and he is handling it rather well. Journalists like revisionism: to debunk the myth, to deconstruct the image. But though it would certainly be titillating to report that Federer, ever more the millionaire with each passing tournament and title, has turned into a menu-chucking, minion-berating egomaniac at the age of 23, there was no evidence of that during an interview with him this week at his hotel in central, postcard-ready Paris with the Louvre and Tuileries gardens nearby and the French Open looming.
Despite the occasional clay-court slip and the rise of Rafael Nadal, Federer's fluid tennis game remains on a pedestal, yet his manner does not.
The handshake and eye contact at hello and good-bye are firm; the attitude and answers disarmingly relaxed. When he yawns once - still recovering from a nearly all-night celebration in Portugal after being named world sportsman of the year by the Laureus Foundation ahead of men like Lance Armstrong, Michael Schumacher and Michael Phelps - he apologizes.
Believe me, it is not always this easy, but what makes the next Grand Slam tournament of the year particularly interesting is that the French Open has never been easy for Federer.
Though he has swept nearly all before him in the last two seasons, winning three of the four major titles in 2004 and putting a head lock on the No. 1 ranking, he has still not made it past the quarterfinals of the world's premier clay-court event.
"I'm having a good feeling this year," Federer said. "I'm not saying I'm going to win it, but I have the feeling I'm going to do better."
He actually began his Grand Slam career at Roland Garros, walking onto the Suzanne Lenglen court at the age of 17 to play Patrick Rafter, the genial Australian, in the first round and losing in straight sets. But while his game and confidence have grown nearly as fast as China's economy since then, that sort of performance has remained more the rule here than the exception.
He was beaten in the first round in Paris again in 2002 and 2003 and still failed to get past the first week during his dreamy 2004 season when three-time French Open champion Gustavo Kuerten bounced him out of the world's premier clay-court event in straight sets in the third round as Federer shanked shots off the frame, slipped repeatedly on the clay and even, gasp, missed an overhead.
The easy explanation is to group him with all the other great modern attacking players who never won at Roland Garros: John McEnroe, Boris Becker, Stefan Edberg and, most recently, Pete Sampras.
But the easy answer would not necessarily be the right answer. Federer, for all his offensive weapons, does not rush the net nearly as often as his predecessors. He also plays with more spin, which allows him more margin for error when conditions get heavy and rallies get long.
"I feel like I stay back much, much more," Federer said. "They almost had to look for the net otherwise they would lose. If you could keep them at the baseline, you were the better man, where I feel like if I'm at the baseline, I'm the better man. Of course with the points I have and the ranking I have, it's natural to feel this way."
Sampras's one-handed backhand was also inferior to Federer's, and the racket head on Sampras's Wilson Pro Staff was 5 square inches, or 32.5 square centimeters, smaller than the one that Federer uses, which is still quite modest by modern standards at 90 square inches.
"I'm not saying with a bigger racket Pete would have won the French, but it would have helped," Federer said.
Unlike McEnroe, Edberg and Sampras, Federer grew up on clay. It was the surface of choice when he was learning the game as a boy in Basel, Switzerland, and he would play on it in the winter, too.
"They would put a big bubble over the court when it got cold," he said. "Up until I was about 12, I really only played on clay."
When he left home at 14 to live at a training center in Ecublens, near Lausanne, the indoor courts were quick Supreme. The outdoor courts were clay.
So there is no compelling reason that Federer can't win on the sticky stuff. He already has. He has won the Masters Series event in Hamburg three times, most recently last week when he did not drop a set along the way.
Hamburg's playing conditions are the slowest of all the major clay court events. It turns out that Federer likes his clay damp and heavy, perhaps because it gives this deeply creative and instinctive player even more time than usual to pull rabbits out of hats with his racket. In Monte Carlo this season, when he was stunned in the quarterfinals by the French teenager Richard Gasquet, he was less than delighted when the organizers did not water the court between the second and third sets.
"Strange, isn't it?" he said of his clay-court tastes.
Though it can get heavy near dusk on a cool, damp day in Paris, the conditions at Roland Garros are generally on the quicker side. Federer's biggest problem has been finding his timing and bearings on the Center Court, where he finally won a match last year only to lose to Kuerten in the next round.
"The dimensions are so strange," he said. "I never really got used to the center court, and I think this is also one of the reasons for what has happened."
That is also the main reason he came straight to Paris on Tuesday after the awards ceremony and celebration in Lisbon. There is nothing like total immersion to overcome a language barrier, and he and his part-time coach, Tony Roche, have been practicing on center court for two hours every day.
"I've got to do it," Federer said. "If I want to win the French, this is the court I'm going to have to do it on, so I better get used to it."
But it is not just about the setting. It is also about the competition. Put Federer on grass, and the number of men with a realistic chance of beating him probably numbers no more than four. Put Federer on clay, where Spaniards and Argentines thrive, and we are quickly into double digits, one of whom is Nadal, the 18-year-old from Mallorca who has won in Monte Carlo, Barcelona and Rome this year and will be seeded No. 4 in his first French Open.
"Quite impressive isn't it?" Federer said, as if he were talking about a sculpture instead of a sculpted young rival. "He's already bigger than me, and he's five years younger. Imagine how he looks in five years. It's impressive, but it's good that you've got these different types of guys and players.
"I like to be challenged by other guys and have that rivalry going, and on the clay I feel like I have many tough opponents, more than on other surfaces."
So could the French Open become an obsession? "Wimbledon will always stay No. 1 in my heart," he said. "That's clear, because of the emotions I had there, and because of my idols. They all won over there, but I am aware that if I can win the French what it does to my spot in history. So for this reason, I think this will always also have a very special place, because I will only get another 7 to 10 to maybe 15 maximum chances."
Fifteen? Federer is clearly keeping his options open and enjoying his tennis.
"If you look at Andre, you almost have to go there," he said, referring to 35-year-old Andre Agassi, who will be playing in his 17th Roland Garros next week.
Federer has turned Agassi into his foil of late, beating him up on different continents and surfaces, but the American still has the edge in the history-making department. He has won in Australia, London, New York and Paris: the only man in the last 35 years to manage it.
Unlike Sampras, Federer's chances of giving Agassi company at some stage in the next one to 15 years are good. He has the shots, the moves and the aura. The questions are in the mind and the legs. As for the manners, may his never change.
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