Dominic Thiem: ‘The Making of a Grand Slam Champion’ (Ep84)

0:00It's very tricky because you start your sport and you do it because you have a lot of fun on the court and you want to compete with the other kids but then you start to earn money. a lot of people who all of a sudden want something from you. So it's super important that you have a good base, that you can trust your family, that you have always somebody you can talk to. You can do a lot of mistakes. Some of them you need to do, but a lot of them you can also avoid. The Australian Open one was really tough because I had my chances and it was so weird because I was so sad and destroyed that I lost.

0:33But on the other hand, I couldn't tell myself what I could have done better because I was playing so good. But the one thing I always thought when I was waking up the next day was, was this my last chance? I wanted that Grand Slam title that was deep in myself, that was my biggest goal I had. And I don't know how I would feel now after my career if I wouldn't have won that title. So I was always saying, hopefully I get another chance.

1:02Hello and welcome to The Business of Sport, the show that takes you behind the scenes with the industry's leading owners, operators and athletes. This week we're delighted to welcome Dominic Thiem to the show. And I mean really delighted. We've waited nearly 100 episodes and finally tennis has arrived, right in the middle of the US Open, which Dominic actually won in a five-set epic in 2020. Now one of the few non-Federo Nadal and Djokovic players to win a slam while those three were at their peak, Dominic's career saw him win 17 ATP titles alongside the Grand Slam before being forced into early retirement at just 31 through injury.

1:39But in his own words, Dominic describes this as a new beginning, not a farewell. From playing through the most incredible era tennis has seen, losing two French Open finals to Rafael Nadal and one Australian Open to Djokovic, receiving over$30 million in prize money, this is a serious education that few could even think about experiencing. So how does Dominic apply this to his life away from the court? And what is it like for a tennis player when they move on from the individual sport that requires your 100 % focus? As a big tennis fan, this was a special show to do with one of the most normal and humble athletes we've had the pleasure of meeting.

2:16A different conversation, full of unique insight, delivered through the sharing of stories that I know we all want to know about. So let's get to it. We are delighted to welcome Dominic to the business of sport. But first, some words from our valued partners. Now what if I told you that the same private equity deals that built sporting empires like Liverpool FC and the Golden State Warriors were now accessible to everyday investors? It's time for you to meet Stride, the regulated digital platform that's democratising sports private equity. For the first time, both individuals and institutions can access exclusive opportunities in professional teams, leagues and the entire sports ecosystem that powers billions in global revenue.

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3:34And the company motto says it all. Stride. Exclusive, but attainable. Dominic, we're so excited to have you here. Sorry it's such shit weather in London today, but thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you so much. It's a great pleasure to be here. So we catch you at a time where you've retired from tennis less than a year ago. How's that been for you? How's the transition? Yeah, it's soon becoming one year of a retired tennis player. And transition went really well. But I think I was lucky that the end of the career was not from one day to another. But I could really plan it. I was deciding it in March last year.

4:15And the last match was in October. So that was really like a transition period. Because I was still feeling like an active player. But also preparing the time after. because I was just 31 when I retired. I was talking to some other athletes who were also retiring or forced to retire pretty early what to do or what advice they can give me to not get a downfall or something. And that really helped. What advice did they give you? I'm intrigued. To keep busy. That was the most advice I got. And it's the one advice I would also give to somebody who calls me up and ask for it. because honestly, my last match was on a Tuesday, and Wednesday was already the first appointment after, so that was amazing, and I was keeping so busy for the weeks after.

5:09How important was it that you were doing things towards the end of your playing career, so that when you actually did finish, it didn't feel like you'd just fallen off a cliff? For me, it was crucial, because I think it's pretty dangerous if you have a downtime or doing nothing for four, five, six months, because the days can get long. And what I also learned, if you don't have a goal like deep inside yourself, it can be really, really tough. So straight away, like in this period of time, I was setting goals for myself outside the court, which I honestly didn't know before. Everything was around tennis and every goal was in the sport and in the tennis.

5:52So I started to set goals like in the outside world, in different departments and that really helped. When you're playing and you're earning a lot of money, do you do financial planning for a career after tennis? Are you educated by agents, by management groups on how to make sure that you're financially set up well post a career? For me personally, when I came up on the rankings and when I started to earn money, I was not interested how or how the money works or what I do with it. I just wanted that at the end of my career, I'm safe financially. That's what I wanted. And I was really lucky that I'm still having him like a great financial advisor.

6:37He was taking care of everything since I was 18 or 19. And it's a really great relationship and I could trust him from the first day on. and it was also super helpful when i got interested in in all the finances and and all the money because i can call him whenever he will explain me everything but i was really lucky to have him from from a very young age remember that time when you did first get interested what was it that intrigued you it was when when i got my injury um when because that was the the first time when And I had a feeling that at one point the tennis career is going to end because the success went down and I was out for like almost one year.

7:23And before that, I was so intense in the world of tennis. I never had any injuries, luckily. So when that injury, the wrist injury happened for the first time, I knew, OK, at one point it's going to be done, the tennis career. and then life is completely different. And then I knew I had to take care a lot more about life outside tennis. And of course, money and finances is a big part of it. Do you remember your first big financial win? It depends, you know, when I was really young and I got the wildcard into my first ATP tournament, you get back then$4 ,000 for a first round loss. and I was 18 back then.

8:12It was an unbelievable amount of money and I didn't know that you have to pay tax free, that the hotel is deducted, that the coach, the agent gets something from it. So I thought that it's$4 ,000 straight in my pocket. It's amazing. At one point, if I'm on the tour, I get this at least every week, so I'm fine. So I didn't know anything about it. So$4 ,000 in the beginning was a lot, But no, the first really big paycheck was Australian Open when I was 20. I qualified and I won my first round match and I got, I think, 50 ,000 Australian dollars. And I was like, holy shit, that's unbelievable. How much money is that?

8:53But still, I didn't know what's happening after with all the takes and all the deductions. How does it break up? when we look at now the reporting of the numbers and even to qualify for Wimbledon now it's up to about 65 ,000, 70 ,000 which is huge for players but when you do take out all of the coach, the physio, travel costs, how does it break down for the players? I think for sure you if you get 65 ,000 pounds in Wimbledon, you will leave the tournament probably with 60 % less, I would say. So, um, you, the, the tax from, from UK or from the country where you get the money gets deducted straight away.

9:34So, uh, and then of course you have to deduct it in your own country and then you have to, uh, pay obviously coaches, travels, all your stuff. And then also it's, interesting for example if i have a deal with with one of my partners i also have to pay tax for the amount of days i was spending in the uk or in the us because um obviously when i play wimbledon when i play us open i'm in the tv there and um everybody sees like the the adidas kit or whatever so i have to pay tax for for that in the country and it's a pretty big amount i was shocked sometimes so those total packages now how much can you plan as a player coming through to make good money but also ensure that you're like you're protecting your development you're continuing to focus in the right ways you're not overspending on a coach how difficult is it to ensure that those people around you are the right ones um it's a lot of experience i would i would say in tennis you start so early you start like with five or six years old i mean there are obviously some exceptions and you don't change coaches too often i would say in average it's like four or five years and it's very tricky because you you start your sport and and you do it because you have a lot of fun on the court and you want to compete with the other kids and then at one point if you get really successful it's all you want but then there are so many things coming on you like you start to earn money there they're coming a lot of people who out of a sudden want something from you who give you so many advices so it's super important that you have like a good base that you can trust your family as well that you have always somebody you can talk to because at the end of the day you can do a lot of mistakes i mean some of them you need to do but a lot of them you can also avoid how does like a contract work with say like an adidas do they pay you every year to wear adidas clothing and shoes is it tied into media commitments what does that contract look like yeah you i mean it's of course clothes and shoes it's um exclusive uh really strict and um you get a retainer like a basic fee but you need to play a certain amount of tournaments to to get it and so when you're injured that's and that's uh you it gets deducted a lot um but also the thing is the retainer is amazing if you're top three in the world if you're top five a big thing is qualifying for for the ATP finals so top eight it's really worth a lot but then if you drop a little bit in the rankings your retainer your your basic fee is going down crazy and then there are bonuses so if you win tournaments 250 500 1000 grand slams each category has has its bonus and it's you can earn really a lot but if you have if you don't have a good season then you you drop down a lot I think there is this one story when when Rafa once finished in the year when he was injured a lot I think number nine and he lost so much from his retainer from Nike so they were able to sign two or three younger players because so much budget got free so it's very interesting and yeah it's like two or three photo shootings each year but it's it's very well planned because the calendar is so tight and do you think about having multiple sponsors then having a Rolex as well and having a aftershave brand um in the beginning of my career no and I was I was having a record sponsor and uh and closing sponsor obviously that's that's the most important for a tennis player but then yeah there are offers coming in and it really needs to fit the personality I would say also for me personally I always like to have long-term relationships which I'm still very happy now that I'm with Adidas since 2011 and and with my with my record brand Bubblot since since 2015 but yeah when there were offers coming in um it always had to go along with with the way i am and with my personality which you didn't want to do but they paid you a lot of money there were yeah i'm not not naming them now but uh there there were like but there are also um offers for um for appearance fee for tournaments of course once you rise the rankings that's getting tricky as well because sometimes the offers are great but it would be much better to take a week off because the body and the mind just needs it at what point was the grand slam success integral to you being able to really drive that attraction you've had four finals you won the us open in 2021 the few people outside of a fedora jokovic natal murray in that era come on unbelievable what is it you del potro cilic yeah medvedev yeah how much did winning change it or Or was it just being in and around the top of the game that had already put you in that category?

14:45Yeah, like being constantly in the top 10, top five, qualifying for the ATP finals, top eight players at the end of the season. Like this already helped me a lot. So the win of the US Open didn't change so much, in my own opinion, with sponsors or with partners. because already before I think honestly it's a little bit of a difference to to play final or to win but at the end you are on on the trophy ceremony you know at the finals you have the the little bit smaller trophy but still you're there with all the all the pictures all the videos so once you're in a final of a slam I think it's just a huge reputation so the wind didn't change that much in that does it not commercially the world doesn't open up if you're a ground slam winner just like the title dominant grand slam winner in my head would be like such a game changer commercially to me no because it was in the middle of covid as well i think that was uh that was a bit of a of a changing aspect as well um that for example like if you win the u.s open in a normal year and next day at six you you get picked up and you get on the biggest morning shows i think in the country and I was doing everything online and you have so many great opportunities in a normal year but me I was doing it online and then I was going on the empty airport on the empty airplane home and there was a full lockdown at home so I think that made a huge difference that it was exactly in the in the toughest times of COVID.

16:22Because in that match you were two sets down when you are in that position you're two sets down where's your mind at to be able to then come back is it is it right now there's no expectation I just got to throw everything at it so I'd relax a little bit yeah there were so many so many thoughts and so many emotions in my mind it was horrible because it was my fourth final it was the first time that both opponents were going I would say 50-50 in the finals because before I was playing twice after the French Open and Novak in the Australian Open so I was going in as a slightly underdog for sure and in this year's open final you could really feel that both players knew that this was the chance to take it and I I couldn't handle it in the beginning.

17:02I was freezing, really. And Sasha was playing very well. But the emotions were horrible from time to time. I was just now, like, before the US Open this year started, it was like in the TV, US Open Classics, and I watched the finals, and it was just all the feelings and emotions coming up again. Not very nice. But what do you tell yourself? You're like, Dominic, get your shit together. You're in front of everyone. The world is watching. You're two sets down. I was playing like shit honestly and I told myself man what's wrong with you really you have this chance all the time when I was in a Grand Slime final I always thought maybe this is the last chance because the road there is really bumpy and it's really tough to get to this final and I was thinking shit you're not gonna you're not gonna do it again what's wrong with you really but there was still a little bit of hope in the back of my mind and at the end I was also a breakdown in the third set and then finally i released a bit because there was nothing to lose i just wanted my my mind was saying yeah probably you're gonna lose but to just try to to play well at least some games and then i released a bit and then in in tennis especially in a best of five match in a grand slam you always get a little chance and this one you have to take and luckily I took it.

18:27And you also know the closer he gets to winning, he's going to start feeling like the same. Yeah, it's always like giving and taking. It's almost never happening that both players are playing super well at the same time. It happened in the French Open Final between Janik and Carlos this year. It was such a high level, but normally always one is on the top and it's always changing. That's what makes it so interesting. When you played those French Open Finals against Rafa, completely honestly everyone goes in no no i back myself to have it was how much of that was a mental challenge just to get on the court and stand on the other side of a net from someone like that um if you are an opponent against ruffler in the french open final they don't make it easy like the tournament doesn't make it easy i think like every dennis fan knows it you go on the center court you you do the warm-up before the match and then um like the the speaker he's introducing you and he says yeah like I don't know 90 DP titles and then this and that and the crowd is like applauding and then he starts to introduce Rafa and he starts winner of the French Open 2005 2006 2007 2008 and the crowd is going crazy then it starts 10, 11, 12, 13 and the crowd is going mad and yeah he already lost the match it's like uh it's it's one of the worst uh it's one of the worst things i've ever experienced i do believe in like positive visualization like seeing seeing the outcome that you want to see before it happens when you go into that are you like fuck i've lost yeah the the first year 2018 it was like that i felt like the underdog and i had a completely wrong mindset first of all i was happy to be in the final then I was physically not on 100 % anymore.

20:18And then Rafa was standing next to me with his huge aura with already 10 French Open titles. And I knew somehow, yeah, today is not the day. But then the year after was completely different. I was beating him some weeks before. And I really was convinced that I'm able to win the finals, to win the French Open. and I didn't see myself as an underdog I saw it as a 50-50 match and I played really well I cannot say anything about it but Terry was so impressive how he was raising his level it was just unbelievable and just kudos to him. How much conversation communication is there between players in tournaments?

21:03There is always joking around in the locker room and especially from from people who are speaking the same languages we go dinner sometimes but it's very it's not deep conversations to be honest it's very light conversations about uh light topics the reason i ask that is because more and more when we speak to footballers or american athletes there is the conversation of business and oh what are you investing in oh who are you partnering with was there ever a conversation about investing money finance with the players on the tour and not really because it's it's very it's very light all the conversations it's a lot choking around and i i don't know it but i think that in a in a team sport you can develop deeper relationships because you see yourself every day for a long time in tennis you see you see each other in the in the locker room for two three minutes and you practice which is with each other but you cannot really talk and then most of the nights most of the dinners you spend with your own team and then you have this con those conversations but not really with your with your fellow colleagues to me what i experienced in between different sports like um when i'm with with some football players i talk more about it first we talk sports because it's really interesting but then also a little bit deeper topics.

22:28Is it lonely on tour? Yes, yeah, because there are nice people to spend time with, but I would say this is not a real deep friendship. And with your own team, it's traveling 40 to 45 weeks a year. And you feel lonely, but you still don't want to see them sometimes because you see them so much. So yeah, it can be lonely sometimes. I'm always fascinated. The Grand Slam kind of period. let's say you make it to something like the semi-finals and you've got two two and a half weeks did you rent a house your whole team together how did you actually set up for those big tournaments in Wimbledon it's uh it's a house yeah like almost everybody rents a house and um do you take the same house every year no no no because sometimes it like if you're lucky you have a good house but then it's already taken for the next year so I didn't take the same house it took the same hotel in most of the Grand Slam tournaments but not the same house but Wimbledon I was never in the semifinals so I don't know how it is there but the Grand Slam journey is a real rollercoaster I would say because if you go deep, if you're lucky enough to go deep semifinals or finals you almost all the time have to survive some tricky situations for example probably the best tournament I've ever played in my life was tennis wise was Australian Open 2020 when I reached the finals and I was really sick in the beginning of the of the tournament like that was right before the COVID outbreak so nobody knows if it was that because all the like many players were really sick and I just had to survive the first two or three matches and then in the second week I was playing myself into the tournament but for me it was always at one point amazing journey, the Grand Slam journey but on the other hand was also really tough because at the end I lost my appetite the only thing I could eat was like white bread with olive oil that was going down so it's very tense but very nice as well We always hear players, they come to an end in an interview and they'll go like Wimbledon's my favourite or is the best grand slam but how different are the four to actually play in and and what makes the tournament a really good one to play in yeah the four slams are are so different but they are unbelievable like as a player you you get everything what you want when you come on site it's not like you come to a tournament site it's like you come almost to to home or to a hotel like everything is taken care of the locker room is is like a living room all the players are chilling on the couches watching tv watching the other matches you have ice bath you have all the physios you have everything what what you need for recovery for pre-match the the food is great at the grand slam tournament so all the four are great and also the masters 1000 it's it's the same but if it comes to the to the lower categories like 250 500 some of them are also really amazing but some of them are pretty rough, I would say.

25:40The locker rooms and everything are not that amazing. I want to go back to the kind of player finance breakdown because a huge topic right now on the business side of tennis has been the players' association, which Djokovic and Pospisil set up. For people who don't know, it's the kind of fight for better distribution of revenue amongst the players. And currently, I think in the Grand Slams, players get about 17 % or so of total revenue. but in other sports they get maybe 40 to 50 percent of total revenue so while we read really big numbers we're also looking at better ways to sustain tennis throughout the whole system so it isn't just big money at the top but we can create sustainable careers for everyone in and around it was that a prominent part when you were playing were these discussions starting to move in this direction to try and ensure that the players were better represented on the finance side in tournaments yes definitely um we we always have the the big players meeting um i think before australian open and before us open and there it was a constant topic um because that what's what's definitely right that tennis is such a big and such global sport with such a huge fan base all around the world and compared to that the number of players who can live from it i think is it's just way too small and also the popularity of the players is is way too small because players ranked 150 ranked 200 they're just unbelievable good tennis players and they can they can beat i would say almost anybody from from the top 100 but like a grand slam tournament just has 128 spots in the main draw if you're 150th in the world how much money do you make in a year give or take so there was a really interesting interview on that and a guy called tara daniel did it recently and he made 180 000 i think in six months but his conversation here was after i've given x amount to the physio the coach i'm left with a very small amount i'm 150th in the world yeah and to actually create a sustained career in this sport at 150 yeah no that should be easy yeah exactly and if you look at 150th footballer in the world yeah look at the premier league player yeah it's like five six million but then you know jokovic obviously has done that as being a key part of this you when you're sitting at the top of the game and you get access to the biggest prize pools do you see it as a responsibility as the top players to ensure the system is better represented i was also just thinking more about it towards the end of my career when i was thinking more about also my own finances and my own money and then how difficult it is and and how complex it is because honestly before i i didn't care too much about it i also didn't care too much about my own finances so do you wish you had more earlier would you have done that for sure would you have done anything differently yes i would educate myself definitely more about finances about money also do a lot more uh stuff outside the court from an earlier age on yeah that's really interesting you wish you'd done more outside the court but then you look at someone like an amuradokanu or any great young talent who suddenly becomes in the spotlight often they are then criticized and performance can dip on the back of multiple partnerships doing too much outside how do you think about that balance i think it depends a lot of what you want to do yourself because if you win i would say like let's say a grand slam and you have 15 partners and you have like 150 days of photo shooting it's just i cannot speak for other people but for me it wouldn't be nice it would be just really exhausting but if you find something from a young age on where you're really interested outside the court doesn't matter if it's finances if it's something completely different for me i think it could have really helped my performance outside the court because you you get some some different stuff on your mind you get relaxed maybe a little bit more you get you get outside your loop i think it can really have a positive influence also on your on-call performance.

30:04But just, you know, and then on that finance, but the ATP have actually tried to address it, haven't they, with this baseline initiative. You mentioned something that I don't think we really consider because, again, in other sports, especially team sports, your contract covers you when you're injured. But a baseline initiative is them now trying to address like a minimum salary that a player can receive from participating on the tour. That injury side, if you are injured, at least you get a secured amount of money. But there must have been some players who are injured for a year and if they are 150, 200 in the world, that could almost ruin their career not necessarily physically but from a financial side yeah definitely but i think they introduced baseline uh two years ago or three years ago but before that um you were you were getting uh nothing when you were injured and uh anyway in tennis if you play well you earn more if you if you lose a lot uh you you earn less and if you're injured you basically earn nothing but you still have to sustain your coach your team also you're you're living at home no so that's uh that's tough and everybody who has like a professional sports career at one point faces those injuries and it can be it can lead to a very tough situation i always wonder this when i look at it and i see the coach that was sitting in a federer or nadal or djokovic's box or you if you're at the top of your game and i always think what do you coach Federer because it's not it's not probably going to be technical because he's just so good maybe it is but like what is the role of of your tennis coach when you're doing all of these sessions what are they working with you on once you're on top like most of the work is done I would say in early age so once you're on the top it's not it's nothing technical or whatever it's you need to look to your coach in in the box and you need to have a good feeling and he needs to give you good energy and he needs to give you trust that's the most important if even in news open finals for example i was not trusting myself as i said i had really bad mindset but i was looking outside to my coach and i i could feel and i could see that he still has a trust in in me that i could still turn around this match and win it and i think if you're on the top if you're playing for the biggest title that's just the most important during the games in the practice it's the same so let's say you're in an australian open final against djokovic or you're in an australian open final against nadal what strategically would a coach say to you to focus on if you're facing rafa or if you're facing djokovic first of all we we would have looked on on the former matches where where i played well but then uh to me or also to my team was always like this against the best players against Novak or against Rafa that the one who is able to push through his own game is going to be the one who wins at the end.

33:00And there's not much about tactics or how you play in the game. It's just for me, it was always, I needed to push through my own game and that I can play my game more than Novak or Rafa could play their own game. but to avoid this that they that they can start to play their own game is so difficult because once like rafa is dominating you and always dominating you there's no way back there's no chance so it's always about pushing through your own game and and your your own power and and your own weapons so it's not like don't get into long baseline exchanges it's not get up to the net as quickly as no no no no how much of a role does data play in in performance in performance management i i i mean i'm wearing an aura since um since one and a half years and for example this is as well something i was wishing for i was i wish i would have done it much earlier with all the jet lag with all the all the traveling uh it could have helped my body so much but as i said that's also one thing like the i'm now super interested in longevity and diet and i just got interested into that in the last two three years so too late unfortunately is there anything that you've done from a longevity or a diet perspective that's had the biggest change um well we are we're back on the on the investing part i was i was investing in one startup it's called the Rewive DNA and they do like a DNA test and I did this one and they give you all those advices on on your genetics what help what nutrition and what supplements help your your genetics and I was a half a year ago it started some months ago I started doing it and there I felt a real change since then I feel so much more energized and again a little bit too late but this one was great and then when I was early 20s I started to change my diet because before I really I ate whatever I wanted I was for sure four or five kilos too much and and I wanted to get them down because it just was so helpful for my game when I was a little bit four or five kilos less so that's when I started to take care a little bit more like not so much sugar and not eating whatever i want every day but those were the two situations what was your pre-match meal i knew that was going um as i said when i was deep in a grand slam i couldn't bring anything down so it was mostly white bread and olive oil or or just a pasta with olive oil so it's not it's not ideally she's not Italian and yeah that was it I was maybe sometimes trying to eat some fruits as well some nuts but that was it and I always expressed before the match when Djokovic went on that it was like 42 match unbeaten run he won at least two maybe more grand slams in that year I can't remember was it 2011 or 2012 they made so much of it being his change in diet when you are looking for those fine margins you mentioned you'd heard nico show with us and he talked about changing the paint on his helmet 80 grams or whatever made him go half a second faster are you looking for those marginal things that will take you into that next level yes um it doesn't matter in in which department i was doing it it can be on the record on the on the string but also of course on on the diet and uh trust me i tried everything diet wise like a gluten-free vegan diet that must be a problem for you gluten-free with your exactly yeah but i was just um getting getting sick after one one and a half months so it was it was nothing for me so i had i needed some time to to find out but i think many players are trying out everything just for those little margins which which are so important especially when it goes towards the end of the big tournaments?

37:18I went off on a tangent with the coach question, but I meant to ask something as we were coming out of the players and creating the sustainability. Because from the financial perspective, one thing that we've seen in sports where I'd say where the athletes are freelancers, particularly in modern sport, those sports have been open for disruption. They've been open for new people coming in and going, hey, live golf. We can offer you the chance to not just make more money, but also choose where you play, play a little bit less. But the core of those products in Live's golf example, for example, of the PGA is if you play in a PGA tournament and you don't make the cut, you don't get paid at all.

37:56For Live Golf, you get paid just for turning up. And suddenly for some of those players, that is a much, much better bet for them to be able to go and operate a top level sport. I look at tennis and I just see a mass opportunity for someone to come in and seriously disrupt the sport. Do you have concerns around the structure of tennis? Yes, for sure. I'm thinking about it. But I'm also thinking about if it would be that bad, actually, if there's somebody new coming in and creating something different. It doesn't mean that the tour, how it is now, it's going to be gone, but maybe there's coming something new, but which is parallel or which can exist in the same time.

38:43but I agree with you that in tennis especially it's quite dangerous and it's quite open that something new is coming but I don't know exactly how the developments are right now. Because all the Grand Slams kind of operate separately correct and then you have the ATP and the WTA and the ITF. Do you as players feel that kind of division at a senior level with so many stakeholders? Yes you feel it a little bit because the Grand Slams they have so much power i mean those those are the tournaments tennis is known for and probably i don't know most of the most of the fans globally they know wimbledon they know us open they know french open they they know australian open they don't know cincinnati masters or they don't know the 500 in acapulco or some they are amazing tournaments but the average tennis fan wants to go to wimbledon and um it's really i don't know if it's like that in other sports but like that the four grand slam tournaments are organized by the itf and all the other tour by the atp so it's they're working together somehow but still it's i think it's a bit complicated which is the best run tournament which one were you like wow seamless slick amazing the four slams runs amazing they also need to how much turnover they make which one's the best in terms of how it's run i would even say australia yeah which one's the worst i wouldn't say that there's a that there's a worse ranch that's interesting i wouldn't necessarily thought that but i do say it i i do see that yeah you won india wells didn't you uh yeah yeah because they always say oh that's like the fifth grand slam how much do you win for winning indian miles 1.1 baby that's great how much do you win for winning the us like this year it's 5 million or something it's amazing yeah do you think that when you're winning you're like oh this can buy a beach house

40:58but it would be really interesting if there was ever an athlete or especially in tennis who thinks that right before the match point like oh if i if i make this match point if i lose i get two million if i win i got four million would be so interesting do you have that moment when you win when you're like oh i need to get my watch i need to put on my jacket jokes aside like genuinely like partnership optimization yes yeah it's uh it's automatic at one point but sure i also i also forgot it already sometimes because you you really need it and put on the watch after after every match for the for the interview who did you have as a watch Rolex it's very nice but do they give you free Rolexes um you have a budget every year wow yeah you can't just walk in and pick diamond encrusted unfortunately no but it's still pretty cool yeah maybe roger can i don't know he can do anything yeah which was the biggest partner to you outside of adidas uh i would say red bull i love this partnership because first of all it's an austrian company and they had long time really troubles to get into tennis first of all i think they didn't want to but then they wanted to but then there's obviously like a sponsor pool on the ATP and on the Grand Slam Tournament.

42:20At Grand Slam Tournaments I still cannot drink the can. I think it's forbidden. There's a funny scene at the US Open 2020 I think if you look on YouTube. So you were on the ATP Tour you also were not allowed to drink the can on the changeovers and And when they changed it, it was possible that Red Bull goes into tennis. And yeah, I was their first player. And the company is simply amazing. And so what do you have to do for that? Drink Red Bull in public? Yeah, that's what Red Bull likes the most. If you drink it in public. I mean, for me, towards the end of a Grand Slam tournament or a tough tournament was the only thing that gets me awake because I drink so much coffee that doesn't get me awake anymore.

43:09But it's so much more about the company because when I was injured or when I had physical troubles, they have this amazing athlete's performance center in Austria and they have like the best contacts ever in the sport world and they can organize you pretty much everything. So I'm still with them, which makes me so happy and it's just a great partnership. We were talking outside, and it's a really interesting point in broader sport, about the longevity of those partnerships with a lot of the tennis players after they've stopped playing. For so many players in football particularly, everyone has to fight so hard when they're playing because once you retire, you're kind of on the heap.

43:47People care much less. But your signing deals, you were just talking about Adidas. You still have that relationship with Red Bull, where even though you've retired and you're not playing these slams in these top tournaments, you're a major brand ambassador for them. Why do you think that is with tennis? that's the i would say it's a single sport first of all i think it's it's a bit easier but then you really need a strategy or you also need a a good life after tennis i would say because during during the career it was kind of easy because um your your sponsors know that you're gonna be in tv every single week ideally i i played well and then i was on the even on the trophy ceremony with the watch, with the Adidas kit, with the bubble, a trackets, all the other sponsors as well.

44:33But then once the career is done, obviously all this falls away. Like there's no more media coverage every single week. So you need to have a story with your partners. And also I think you need to have a story after your career. For me, it's a lot about that sustainability that I'm with the topic sustainability since quite a lot of years. And building that story, I think, helped to sustain the relationship with my partners. And that's why most of them I was able to keep, which is, of course, super nice that I'm not playing anymore, but I still have a great relationship and partnership with all of them.

45:19So that demand from Adidas, while you're playing, the requirements are you wear the kid on screen, you have the physical kind of more tangible approach. When you retire, it then becomes more developing different kind of business lines for them, working with them on a sustainability play. So they shift the responsibilities on you, but they keep the relationship strong. Yeah, exactly. I was, for example, I was testing the new shoes, the new models of the tennis shoes, because I'm still playing and I'm giving them the first insights of the shoes. And then I'm going end of September. I'm going to the headquarters there together with Angie Kerber.

46:02She's also retired now. She's like a three times Grand Slam champion. And we do a kids clinic because they have like a huge kids clinic. I think where kids have their first try in our case in tennis and we spend two nice days with them. So it's more about those different stories. We mentioned that like longevity and extending that beyond. One way to do that is to own your own channel and to own a social presence. When you were playing, were you thinking about how do I build up my personal brand on Instagram and doing a, hey, behind the scenes and like, hey, we're going to the US Open and hey, hey, this is my pretty much meal.

46:39And I started to do it more professional four years ago. And since then I do it before, I just wanted to have a million followers. There was a big goal on Instagram. Yeah, exactly. But I was doing it for a long time all by myself, like with one friend, but just for fun basically. And but since four years more professional and yeah, that's an advice I could give to every athlete to start as soon as possible because you wouldn't say, you wouldn't say, hey, it's distracting. Don't do it. You'd say, hey, it's good. You make more money. It's good for partnerships. Yeah, if you use it useful, of course, then you have to use it.

47:21But Sabalenka's doing it as world number one. Oh my God, yeah. They have dance videos. Dance videos, but also now she's doing like a vlog. So on her channel, she is filming all the behind the scenes, the travel in the house, everything that goes in and around the tournament. interesting yeah yeah and she's world number one so you know it's the it's the piece of you can do it while you're at the top yeah um but as you said take control of your she's doing that it's her own content but when you then speak to partners today is your social media part of their package they're like hey we want to be on your instagram we want to be included in posts yeah yeah yeah because i for for for i think for austria i have a really huge number of followers luckily so You've got more followers than people in Austria.

48:08No, unfortunately not. That was a goal, but I couldn't reach it.

48:14Should have won that French Open. Yeah, that would have helped for sure. When you win an Open or like a Grand Slam, like the US Open, do you just wake up and be like, that's 100 ,000 more followers? Yeah, yeah. First of all, I didn't wake up because I didn't go to sleep. I just couldn't. But yeah, definitely, that's a huge boost. For me, it was so difficult to get followers. Compared to other sports, like if you compare to football players, they all have so many followers. In tennis, it's a bit different. But the Grand Slam finals, they just helped so much, especially if it was against Rafa or against Novak.

48:49They have themselves 20, 25 million followers. So you get some from them. So yeah, each slam final is for sure 100 ,000 followers. Yeah, I'm always interested. You know, we saw the female tennis player who didn't like being interviewed after matches. Naomi Osaka. Naomi Osaka. do you think players should be interviewed after matches and that's part and parcel of the game and you have to give the fans what they want or do you think that actually if you've just lost being asked how do you feel is quite a stupid fucking question and actually you should have a bit of privacy and a bit of time um honestly you the interviews what for example what naomi Osaka didn't want to do they are not for the fans they're just for the for the media um if you're the on-court interview anyway only the winner gets so if you win you're any you're happy to to give that interview as well but i think um it's too much because after every single match you have to you have to basically answer the same questions if you play 35 tournaments a year it's 35 times the same question um so it's too much i think you should or they should reduce it a bit i mean if you if you won or lost if if it's a big surprise of course you have to do it but i don't know if you're number one in the world and you won your second round match six two six one and you have to answer the same questions again for 30 minutes i think it's just too much so it's a little bit quality above quantity and which is not which is not happening at the moment i would say because also in in football like sometimes the players are with the coach on the press conference you choose the players but they don't have to be there every single time but then you also have the concentration of financials towards one player you have the concentration of brand i'm a little bit harder i'm like suck it up like you want all the best sorry you want all the benefits of being a single sport which it is i think it's actually like an opportunity i know that sounds really yeah but i guess you said if you were maybe going into those and were asked a set of questions that were slightly different or maybe a little bit more interesting or could be dissected slightly differently rather than also you know that they're just gonna take 30 seconds now for tiktok and it's where you were like that's a stupid question i don't want to ask it they'll be like dominic responds badly and it's like yeah i get you there but it's it's what we have talked before if sometimes i really enjoy interviews or content like here i really enjoy because it's so nice it's a little bit deeper but as i said in an interview it's all the same question so there's no value to that federer nadal jokovic he's the guy yeah exactly yeah it's like messi ronaldo exactly yeah when you lose a grand slam final when you do go to sleep that night say what do you tell yourself when you wake up um honestly the i was i was happy that all the tension was over for the two weeks so it was a huge relief first of all um but then of course i was uh sad and and completely empty just uh probably not not going out of the of the hotel room much or flying home next day and just just lying around but then the Australian Open one was really tough because I had my chances and it was so weird because I was so sad and destroyed that I lost but on the other hand I couldn't tell anything to myself what I could have done better because I was playing so good so that was a really tough situation but the one thing I always thought when I was waking up the next day was this is my last chance because especially the last five, six years of my career, I wanted that Grand Slam title that was deep in myself.