CHAP-TER 1 THE SI-LENCE OF THE CEN-TRE COURT The si-lence, thats what strikes you when you pla

y on Wim-ble-dons Cen-tre Court. You bounce the b all sound-less-ly up and down on the soft turf; yo u toss it up to serve; you hit it and you hear the echo of your own shot. And of every shot after th at. Clack, clack; clack, clack . The trimmed grass , the rich his-to-ry, the an-cient sta-di-um, the play-ers dressed in white, the re-spect-ful crowds , the ven-er-a-ble tra-di-tionnot a bill-board ad -ver-tise-ment in viewall com-bine to en-close an d cush-ion you from the out-side world. The feel-i ng suits me; the cathe-dral hush of the Cen-tre Co urt is good for my game. Be-cause what I bat-tle h ard-est to do in a ten-nis match is to quiet the v oic-es in my head, to shut ev-ery-thing out of my mind but the con-test it-self and con-cen-trate ev ery atom of my being on the point I am play-ing. I f I made a mis-take on a pre-vi-ous point, for-get it; should a thought of vic-to-ry sug-gest it-sel f, crush it. The si-lence of the Cen-tre Court is bro-ken when a points done, if its been a good pointbe-cause the Wim-ble-don crowds can tell the dif-fer-enceby a shock of noise; ap-plause, chee rs, peo-ple shout-ing your name. I hear them, but as if from some place far off. I dont reg-is-ter that there are fif-teen thou-sand peo-ple hunched around the arena, track-ing every move my op-po-ne nt and I make. I am so fo-cused I have no sense at all, as I do now re-flect-ing back on the Wim-ble -don final of 2008 against Roger Fed-er-er, the bi ggest match of my life, that there are mil-lions w atch-ing me around the world. I had al-ways dreamed of play-ing here at Wim-bledon. My uncle Toni, who has been my coach all my l ife, had drummed into me from an early age that th is was the biggest tour-na-ment of them all. By th e time I was four-teen, I was shar-ing with my fri ends the fan-ta-sy that Id play here one day and

win. So far, though, Id played and lost, both tim es against Fed-er-erin the final here the year be -fore, and the year be-fore that. The de-feat in 2 006 had not been so hard. I went out onto the cour t that time just pleased and grate-ful that, hav-i ng just turned twen-ty, Id made it that far. Feder-er beat me pret-ty eas-i-ly, more eas-i-ly than if Id gone out with more be-lief. But my de-feat in 2007, which went to five sets, left me ut-terly de-stroyed. I knew I could have done bet-ter, t hat it was not my abil-i-ty or the qual-i-ty of my game that had failed me, but my head. And I wept after that loss. I cried in-ces-sant-ly for half a n hour in the dress-ing room. Tears of dis-ap-poin t-ment and self-re-crim-i-na-tion. Los-ing al-ways hurts, but it hurts much more when you had your c hance and threw it away. I had beat-en my-self as much as Fed-er-er had beat-en me; I had let my-self dow n and I hated that. I had flagged men-tal-ly, I ha d al-lowed my-self to get dis-tract-ed; I had veer ed from my game plan. So stupid, so un-nec-es-sary . So ob-vi-ous-ly, so ex-act-ly what you must not do in a big game. My uncle Toni, the tough-est of ten-nis coach-es, is usu-al-ly the last per-son in the world to offe r me con-so-la-tion; he crit-i-cizes me even when I win. It is a mea-sure of what a wreck I must hav e been that he aban-doned the habit of a life-time and told me there was no rea-son to cry, that the re would be more Wim-ble-dons and more Wim-ble-don fi-nals. I told him he didnt un-der-stand, that this had prob-a-bly been my last time here, my las t chance to win it. I am very, very keen-ly aware of how short the life of a pro-fes-sion-al ath-let e is, and I can-not bear the thought of squan-dering an op-por-tu-ni-ty that might never come again . I know I wont be happy when my ca-reer is over, and I want to make the best of it while it lasts. Every sin-gle mo-ment countsthats why Ive al-w ays trained very hardbut some mo-ments count for more than oth-ers, and I had let a big one pass in 2007. Id missed an op-por-tu-ni-ty that might ne

ver come again; just two or three points here or t here, had I been more fo-cused, would have made al l the dif-fer-ence. Be-cause vic-to-ry in ten-nis turns on the tini-est of mar-gins. Id lost the la st and fifth set 62 against Fed-er-er, but had I just been a lit-tle more clear-head-ed when I was 42 or even 52 down, had I seized my four chances to break his serve early on in the set (in-stead of seiz-ing up, as I did), or had I played as if t his were the first set and not the last, I could have won it. There was noth-ing Toni could do to ease my grief. Yet he turned out, in the end, to be right. An-ot h-er chance had come my way. Here I was again, jus t one year later. I was de-ter-mined now that Id learn the les-son from that de-feat twelve months ear-li-er, that what-ev-er else gave way this time , my head would not. The best sign that my head wa s in the right place now was the con-vic-tion, for all the nerves, that I would win. At din-ner with fam-i-ly and friends and team members the night be-fore, at the house we rent when I play at Wim-ble-don, across the road from the Al l Eng-land Club, men-tion of the match had been of f lim-its. I didnt ex-press-ly pro-hib-it them fr om rais-ing the sub-ject, but they all un-der-stoo d well enough that, what-ev-er else I might have b een talk-ing about, I was al-ready be-gin-ning to play the match in a space in-side my head that, fr om here on in until the start of play, should re-m ain mine alone. I cooked, as I do most nights during the Wim-ble-don fort-night. I enjoy it, and my fam-i-ly thinks its good for me. Some-thing else to help set-tle my mind. That night I grilled som e fish and served some pasta with shrimps. After d in-ner I played darts with my un-cles Toni and Raf ael, as if this were just an-oth-er evening at hom e in Man-a-cor, the town on the Span-ish is-land o f Mal-lor-ca where I have al-ways lived. I won. Ra fael claimed later that hed let me win, so Id be in a bet-ter frame of mind for the final, but I d ont be-lieve him. Its im-por-tant for me to win,

at ev-ery-thing. I have no sense of humor about los-ing. At a quar-ter to one I went to bed, but I couldnt sleep. The sub-ject we had cho-sen not to talk ab out was the only one on my mind. I watched films o n TV and only dozed off at four in the morn-ing. A t nine I was up. It would have been bet-ter to hav e slept a few hours more, but I felt fresh, and Ra fael Maym, my phys-i-cal ther-a-pist, who is al-w ays in at-ten-dance, said it made no dif-fer-ence that the ex-cite-ment and the adrenaline would car ry me through, how-ev-er long the game went on. For break-fast I had my usual. Some ce-re-al, or-a nge juice, a milk choco-late drinknever cof-feea nd my fa-vorite from home, bread sprin-kled with s alt and olive oil. Id woken up feel-ing good. Ten -nis is so much about how you feel on the day. Whe n you get up in the morn-ing, any or-di-nary morning, some-times you feel bright and healthy and st rong; other days you feel muggy and frag-ile. That day I felt as alert and nim-ble and full of en-er -gy as I ever had. It was in that mood that at ten thir-ty I crossed the road for my final train-ing ses-sion at Wim-bl e-dons Court 17, close to the Cen-tre Court. Be-f ore I start-ed hit-ting, I lay down on a bench, as I al-ways do, and Rafael Maymwho I nick-name T itnbent and stretched my knees, mas-saged my le gs, my shoul-der, and then gave spe-cial at-ten-ti on to my feet. (My left foot is the most vul-ner-a -ble part of my body, where it hurts most often, m ost painful-ly.) The idea is to wake up the mus-cl es and re-duce the pos-si-bil-i-ty of in-juries. U su-al-ly Id hit balls for an hour in the warm-up be-fore a big match, but this time, be-cause it wa s driz-zling, I left it after twen-ty-five min-utes. I start-ed gen-tly, a s al-ways, and grad-u-al-ly in-creased the pace un til I ended up run-ning and hit-ting with the same in-ten-si-ty as in a match. I trained with more n erves than usual that morn-ing, but also with grea ter con-cen-tra-tion. Toni was there and so was Ti tn, and my agent, Car-los Costa, a for-mer pro-fe

s-sion-al ten-nis play-er, who was there to warm u p with me. I was more quiet than usual. We all wer e. No jokes. No smiles. When we wrapped up, I coul d tell, just from a glance, that Toni was not too happy, that he felt I hadnt been hit-ting the bal l as clean-ly as I might have. He looked re-proach -fulIve known that look all my lifeand wor-ried . He was right that I hadnt been at my sharpest j ust then, but I knew some-thing that he didnt, an d never could, enor-mous-ly im-por-tant as he had been in the whole of my ten-nis ca-reer: phys-i-ca l-ly I felt in per-fect shape, save for a pain on the sole of my left foot that Id have to have tre at-ed be-fore I went on court, and in-side I bore the sin-gle-mind-ed con-vic-tion that I had it in me to win. Ten-nis against a rival with whom your e even-ly matched, or whom you have a chance of be at-ing, is all about rais-ing your game when its need-ed. A cham-pi-on plays at his best not in the open-ing rounds of a tour-na-ment but in the se-m i-fi-nals and fi-nals against the best op-po-nents , and a great ten-nis cham-pi-on plays at his best in a Grand Slam final. I had my fearsI was in a con-stant bat-tle to con-tain my nervesbut I foug ht them down, and the one thought that oc-cu-pied my brain was that today Id rise to the oc-ca-sion. I was phys-i-cal-ly fit and in good form. I had pl ayed very well a month ear-li-er at the French Ope n, where Id beat-en Fed-er-er in the final, and I d played some in-cred-i-ble games here on grass. The two last times wed met here at Wim-ble-don he d gone in as the fa-vorite. This year I still fel t I wasnt the fa-vorite. But there was a dif-ference. I didnt think that Fed-er-er was the fa-vor ite to win ei-ther. I put my chances at fifty-fifty. I also knew that, most prob-a-bly, the bal-ance of poor-ly cho-sen or poor-ly struck shots would sta nd at close to fifty-fifty be-tween us by the time it was all over. That is in the na-ture of ten-ni s, es-pe-cial-ly with two play-ers as fa-mil-iar w ith each others game as Fed-er-er and I are. You might think that after the mil-lions and mil-lions

of balls Ive hit, Id have the basic shots of te n-nis sewn up, that re-li-ably hit-ting a true, sm ooth, clean shot every time would be a piece of ca ke. But it isnt. Not just be-cause every day you wake up feel-ing dif-fer-ent-ly, but be-cause ever y shot is dif-fer-ent; every sin-gle one. From the mo-ment the ball is in mo-tion, it comes at you a t an in-finites-i-mal num-ber of an-gles and speed s; with more top-spin, or back-spin, or flat-ter, or high-er. The dif-fer-ences might be minute, micro-scop-ic, but so are the vari-a-tions your body makesshoul-ders, elbow, wrists, hips, an-kles, k neesin every shot. And there are so many other fa c-torsthe weath-er, the sur-face, the rival. No b all ar-rives the same as an-oth-er; no shot is ide n-ti-cal. So every time you line up to hit a shot, you have to make a split-sec-ond judg-ment as to the tra-jec-to-ry and speed of the ball and then m ake a split-sec-ond de-ci-sion as to how, how hard, and where you must try and hit t he shot back. And you have to do that over and ove r, often fifty times in a game, fif-teen times in twen-ty sec-onds, in con-tin-u-al bursts more than two, three, four hours, and all the time youre r un-ning hard and your nerves are taut; its when y our co-or-di-na-tion is right and the tempo is smo oth that the good sen-sa-tions come, that you are bet-ter able to man-age the bi-o-log-i-cal and men -tal feat of strik-ing the ball clean-ly in the mi d-dle of the rac-quet and aim-ing it true, at spee d and under im-mense men-tal pres-sure, time after time. And of one thing I have no doubt: the more you train, the bet-ter your feel-ing. Ten-nis is, more than most sports, a sport of the mind; it is the play-er who has those good sen-sa-tions on the most days, who man-ages to iso-late him-self best from his fears and from the ups and downs in mora le a match in-evitably brings, who ends up being w orld num-ber one. This was the goal I had set my-s elf dur-ing my three pa-tient years as num-ber two to Fed-er-er, and which I knew I would be very cl ose to reach-ing if I won this Wim-ble-don final.

When the match it-self would ac-tu-al-ly begin was an-oth-er ques-tion. I looked up and saw patch-es of blue in the sky. But it was most-ly over-cast, with thick, dark clouds glow-er-ing on the hori-z on. The game was due to start in three hours, but there was every chance it might be de-layed or inter-rupt-ed. I didnt let that worry me. My mind w as going to be clear and fo-cused this time, whatev-er hap-pened. No dis-trac-tions. I was not goin g to allow any room for a re-peat of my fail-ure of con-cen-tra-tion in 2007. We left Court 17 at about eleven thir-ty and went to the lock-er room, the one at the All Eng-land C lub thats re-served for the top seeds. Its not v ery big, maybe a quar-ter of the size of a ten-nis court. But the tra-di-tion of the place is what g ives it its grandeur. The wood pan-els, the green and pur-ple col-ors of Wim-ble-don on the walls, t he car-pet-ed floor, the knowl-edge that so many g reatsLaver, Borg, McEn-roe, Con-nors, Sam-prasha ve been there. Usu-al-ly its busy in there, but n ow that there were just the two of us left in the tour-na-ment, I was alone. Fed-er-er hadnt showed up yet. I had a show-er, changed, and went up a c ou-ple of flights of stairs to have lunch in the p lay-ers din-ing room. Again, it was un-usu-al-ly quiet, but this suit-ed me. I was with-draw-ing de ep-er into my-self, iso-lat-ing my-self from my su r-round-ings, set-tling into the rou-tinesthe inflex-i-ble rou-tinesI have be-fore each match and that con-tin-ue right up to the start of play. I ate what I al-ways eat. Pastano sauce, noth-ing t hat could pos-si-bly cause in-di-ges-tionwith oli ve oil and salt, and a straight, sim-ple piece of fish. To drink: water. Toni and Titn were at the table with me. Toni was brood-ing. But thats noth -ing new. Titn was placid. He is the per-son in w hose com-pa-ny I spend the most time and hes al-w ays placid. Again, we spoke lit-tle. I think Toni might have grum-bled about the weath-er, but I sai d noth-ing. Even when Im not play-ing a tour-na-m

ent, I lis-ten more than I talk. At one oclock, with an hour to go be-fore the star t of play, we went back down to the lock-er room. An un-usu-al thing about ten-nis is that even in the biggest tour-na-ments you share a lock-er room with your op-po-nent. Fed-er-er was al-ready in there, sit-ting on the wood-en bench w here he al-ways sits, when I came in after lunch. Be-cause were used to it, there was no awk-ward-n ess. None that I felt, any-way. In a lit-tle while we were going to do ev-ery-thing we pos-si-bly co uld to crush each other in the biggest match of th e year, but were friends as well as ri-vals. Othe r ri-vals in sports might hate each others guts e ven when theyre not play-ing against each other. We dont. We like each other. When the game starts , or is about to start, we put the friend-ship to one side. Its noth-ing per-son-al. I do it with e v-ery-body around me, even my fam-i-ly. I stop bei ng the or-di-nary me when a game is on. I try and be-come a ten-nis ma-chine, even if the task is ul -ti-mate-ly im-pos-si-ble. I am not a robot; per-f ec-tion in ten-nis is im-pos-si-ble, and try-ing t o scale the peak of your pos-si-bil-i-ties is wher e the chal-lenge lies. Dur-ing a match you are in a per-ma-nent bat-tle to fight back your ev-ery-da y vul-ner-a-bil-i-ties, bot-tle up your human feel -ings. The more bot-tled up they are, the greater your chances of win-ning, so long as youve traine d as hard as you play and the gap in tal-ent is no t too wide be-tween you and your rival. The gap in tal-ent with Fed-er-er ex-ist-ed, but it was not im-pos-si-bly wide. It was nar-row enough, even on his fa-vorite sur-face in the tour-na-ment he pla yed best, for me to know that if I si-lenced the d oubts and fears, and ex-ag-ger-at-ed hopes, in-sid e my head bet-ter than he did, I could beat him. Y ou have to cage your-self in pro-tec-tive armor, turn your into a blood-less war-rior. Its a kind of self-hy p-no-sis, a game you play, with dead-ly se-ri-ousness, to dis-guise your own weak-ness-es from your -self, as well as from your rival.

To joke or chat-ter about foot-ball with Fed-er-er in the lock-er room, as we might be-fore an ex-hi -bi-tion match, would have been a lie he would hav e seen through im-me-di-ate-ly and in-ter-pret-ed as a sign of fear. In-stead, we did each other the cour-tesy of being hon-est. We shook hands, nod-d ed, ex-changed the faintest of smiles, and stepped over to our re-spec-tive lock-ers, maybe ten pace s away from each other, and then each pre-tend-ed the other wasnt there. Not that I re-al-ly need-e d to pre-tend. I was in that lock-er room and I wa snt. I was re-treat-ing into some place deep in-s ide my head, my move-ments in-creas-ing-ly pro-gra mmed, au-to-mat-ic. Forty-five min-utes be-fore the game was sched-ule d to start I took a cold show-er. Freez-ing cold w ater. I do this be-fore every match. Its the poin t be-fore the point of no re-turn; the first step in the last phase of what I call my pre-game rit-u -al. Under the cold show-er I enter a new space in which I feel my power and re-silience grow. Im a dif-fer-ent man when I emerge. Im ac-ti-vat-ed. Im in the flow, as sports psy-chol-o-gists de-s cribe a state of alert con-cen-tra-tion in which t he body moves by pure in-stinct, like a fish in a cur-rent. Noth-ing else ex-ists but the bat-tle ahead. Just as well, be-cause the next thing I had to do w as not some-thing that, in or-di-nary cir-cum-stances, I would ac-cept with calm. I went down-stairs to a small med-i-cal room to have my doc-tor give me a painkilling in-jec-tion in the s ole of my left foot. Id had a blis-ter and a swel ling around one of the tiny metatarsal bones down there since the third round. That part of the foot had to be put to sleep, oth-er-wise I sim-ply cou ldnt have playedthe pain would have been too great. Then it was up to the lock-er room again and back to my rit-u-al. I put on my ear-phones and lis-ten ed to music. It sharp-ens that sense of flow, re-m oves me fur-ther from my sur-round-ings. Then Tit n ban-daged my left foot. While he did that, I put the grips on my rac-quets, all six Id be tak-ing

on court. I al-ways do this. They come with a bla ck pre-grip. I roll a white tape over the black on e, spin-ning the tape around and around, work-ing di-ag-o-nal-ly up the shaft. I dont need to think about it, I just do it. As if in a trance. Next, I lay down on a mas-sage table and Titn wra pped a cou-ple of straps of ban-dage around my leg s, just below the knees. Id had aches there too, and the straps helped pre-vent sore-ness, or eased the pain if it came. Play-ing sports is a good thing for or-di-nary peo -ple; sport played at the pro-fes-sion-al level is not good for your health. It push-es your body to lim-its that human be-ings are not nat-u-ral-ly e quipped to han-dle. Thats why just about every to p pro-fes-sion-al ath-lete has been laid low by in -jury, some-times a ca-reer-end-ing in-jury. There was a mo-ment in my ca-reer when I se-ri-ous-ly won-dered whether Id be able to contin-ue com-pet-ing at the top level. I play throug h pain much of the time, but I think all elite spo rts peo-ple do. All ex-cept Fed-er-er, at any rate . Ive had to push and mold my body to adapt it to cope with the repet-i-tive mus-cu-lar stress that ten-nis forces on you, but he just seems to have been born to play the game. His physiquehis DNAs eems per-fect-ly adapt-ed to ten-nis, ren-der-ing him im-mune to the in-juries the rest of us are do omed to put up with. They tell me he doesnt train as hard as I do. I dont know if its true, but i t would fig-ure. You get these blessed freaks of n a-ture in other sports, too. The rest of us just h ave to learn to live with pain, and long breaks fr om the game, be-cause a foot, a shoul-der, or a le g has sent a cry for help to the brain, ask-ing it to stop. Thats why I need to have so much ban-da g-ing done be-fore a match; thats why its such a crit-i-cal part of my prepa-ra-tions. After Titn had done my knees, I stood up, got dre ssed, went to a basin, and ran water through my ha ir. Then I put on my ban-dan-na. Its an-oth-er ma -neu-ver that re-quires no thought, but I do it sl

ow-ly, care-ful-ly, tying it tight-ly and very delib-er-ate-ly be-hind the back of my head. Theres a prac-ti-cal point to it: keep-ing my hair from falling over my eyes. But its also an-oth-er mo-m ent in the rit-u-al, an-oth-er de-ci-sive mo-ment of no re-turn, like the cold show-er, when my sens e is sharp-ened that very soon Ill be en-ter-ing bat-tle. It was near-ly time to go on court. The adrenaline rush, creep-ing up on me all day, flood-ed my ner-vous sys-tem. I was breath-ing har d, burst-ing to re-lease en-er-gy. But I had to si t still a mo-ment longer as Titn ban-daged the fi n-gers of my left hand, my play-ing hand, his move s as me-chan-i-cal and silent as mine when I wrap the grips around my rac-quets. Theres noth-ing co s-met-ic about this. With-out the ban-dages, the s kin would stretch and tear dur-ing the game. I stood up and began ex-er-cis-ing, vi-o-lent-lya c-ti-vat-ing my ex-plo-sive-ness, as Titn calls i t. Toni was on hand, watch-ing me, not say-ing muc h. I didnt know whether Fed-er-er was watch-ing m e too. I just know hes not as busy as I am in the lock-er room be-fore a match. I jumped up and dow n, ran in short bursts from one end of the cramped space to the otherno more than six me-ters or so . I stopped short, ro-tat-ed my neck, my shoul-der s, my wrists, crouched down and bent my knees. The n more jumps, more mi-ni-sprints, as if I were alo ne in my gym back home. Al-ways with my ear-phones on, the music pump-ing in-side my head. I went to take a pee. (I find my-self tak-ing a lot of pees ner-vous peesjust be-fore a game, some-times fiv e or six in that final hour.) Then I came back, sw ung my arms high and round my shoul-ders, hard. Toni ges-tured, I took off the ear-phones. He said there was a rain delay, but for no more than fifteen min-utes, they thought. I wasnt fazed. I was ready for this. Rain would have the same ef-fect on Fed-er-er as it would on me. No need to be thro wn off bal-ance. I sat down and checked my rac-quets, felt the bal-ance, the weigh

t; pulled up my socks, checked that both were ex-a ct-ly the same height on my calves.