Rafael Nadal has admitted that he never set himself a target on how many Grand Slams he wanted to win and is in awe of how much he has accomplished in his storied career.
Nadal, 37, is expected to return from a hip injury at next month’s Brisbane International – an ATP 250 event in Australia that will mark his first tournament appearance in precisely a year. After an extended break focused on rehab and training, he is raring to go again.
The Spaniard has won 22 Grand Slams in his distinguished career and played in the golden era of men’s tennis, in which he competed with Swiss legend Roger Federer and Serbia’s history-making machine Novak Djokovic.
While it appears Nadal is losing in the battle to finish his career with the most Grand Slams of any man to his longtime rival Djokovic, he recently explained how he never imagined winning more than one Grand Slam title after he topped the podium on his Roland Garros debut in 2005.
“When I won my first Grand Slam (2005 Roland Garros), I thought it was going to be the only one I’d win. And then, every time, I won a Grand Slam. I was amazed, I thought, now I can really relax. It’ll probably be my last one. Now I’ve achieved something and that’s already huge.”
At Roland Garros, Nadal has amassed a record haul of 14 French Opens, which is the same of Grand Slams that American tennis legend Pete Sampras managed to win in his illustrious career – a player who was once considered the yardstick of Grand Slam numbers.
Nadal, speaking to former French WTA player Alize Lim on Eurosport, added that he didn’t set a target for himself when he traveled to compete from a young age but was determined to do well only in his next tournament.
“When I was a kid, I never said to myself ‘I want to win a Grand Slam, I want to win Grand Slams, I want to be the best’. I was thinking about the tournament of the next week.”
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