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Rafael Nadal already rests in his house in Manacor after having conquered the United States Open , the fourth success in New York and the nineteenth Grand Slam of his career. The Mallorcan starred with the Russian Daniil Medvedev one of the finals of Grand Slam with more epic in recent times. Become the player who earns the most over thirty does not seem to give relevance to the possibility of reaching Roger Federer , the player with the greatest majors in history. Twenty large trophies illuminate the Swiss career. Nineteen, after winning in New York, the Spanish.

The Balearic recover from the effort and emotions experienced after the victory against Medvedev . Do not look at the calendar. Only rehabilitate the body after exhaustion.

The challenges have become a personal matter for the Spanish player who at 33 years still acknowledges having "ambition and motivation" in tennis. Of course, it continues its path regardless of any "spirit of revenge" and regardless of what can be said about him.

"Just as many people doubted that I could play for so many years, me too. I doubt now and have always doubted. But here I am and in the end it is a day-to-day issue. I am happy with what I do. And if my body makes me It allows daily training and I enjoy the competition ... ", says Nadal, who wants to be, above all, competitive. "What motivates me and my goal is to aspire to the maximum possible time," says Nadal, who considers as new and immediate challenges the Masters Cup that has not yet managed to conquer and the new Davis Cup , which starts next November in Madrid, as a climax to a dream year.

"I'm physically touching"

Nadal acknowledges being "fatigued" after the splurge and physical demand that required the win against Daniil Medvedev to add his fourth success in New York and raise the number of Grand Slam accumulated to 19. "I am tired; the truth is that I am not recovered. I am physically touching," the Balearic tennis player acknowledges in a telephone meeting with the media that have accompanied him in New York.

The recovery after the effort and the emotions lived hours after the battle with Medvedev now captures Nadal's interest, which prefers to park provisionally, the definition of what remains of the calendar. Even so, it assumes the Tokyo Olympic Games as a somewhat more distant challenge. At 33 years old and only a major to match Roger Federer as the tennis player as a greater number of Grand Slams in Nadal history prefers to wait to see "how your physique evolves" in the coming days and talk to your coaching staff to define their next challenges

But the Balearic has underlined in his "immediate calendar" two appointments: the new Davis Cup and the London Masters Cup that puts the climax to the circuit and is the only renowned tournament that still resists him. "To define a bit, Asia remains , " Rafael Nadal acknowledged. "Beyond that, everyone knows what the Olympic Games represent for me and I will do my best to try to arrive in the best way, with the best possible preparation for those in Tokyo."

Tokyo Games

The Olympic event is part of one of the challenges of Spanish in 2020. They start next July 24 in Japan, right in the middle of Wimbledon and the start of the American circuit. "But some Games are something special," insists the Balearic, who won the gold medal in the 2008 Beijing and that in the last, in Rio 2016, was fourth, at the gates of the medals. Nadal is aware that it must be dosed to continue at the highest level. In the final stretch of a great season, with two more Grand Slam on its service sheet, it takes on the projects as challenges. "Some Olympic Games do not mark the whole year in tennis as in other sports, such as athletics, and it makes difficult a specific planning for it and complicates the calendar a lot," says Nadal, who remembers that he always lives the Olympic events with a great delusion.

Rafael Nadal regrets that Spanish tennis has not been able to take full advantage of the good performance offered in recent decades. The tennis player from Manacor is clear that in Spain the "failure" of not taking advantage of the high level of his players has been committed. And that has served to attract resources to support young people. "We have been doing things for many years that will be very difficult to repeat. In the end what has been achieved in the last 25-30 years is hardly repeatable, by means, by economic capacity ... in the end we are competing with other countries that have an economic capacity that is multiplied by infinity practically "with respect to Spain, recalls Nadal.

In this sense, the number two in world tennis, although very close to the first, Novak Djokovic, points out that the four countries that own a Grand Slam (Australia, United States, London and Paris) "have an infinitely higher budget ours for tennis. " "In Spain we have had a failure in this regard and it is that during all these years of great boom in Spanish tennis we have not been able as a Federation to have our own tournament, which generates annual income that can serve to promote our sport and to help to the new generations that are coming, "reasons the Balearic.

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