MUTUA MADRID OPEN

April 28, 2023

Iga Swiatek

Press Conference

I. SWIATEK/J. Grabher

6-3, 6-2

THE MODERATOR: Congratulations. How important was it to get a win tonight to start your Madrid campaign?

IGA SWIATEK: Well, for sure, you know, first matches are tricky, so I'm happy that I'm through and I have already this experience of playing on center court.

It's true it's a little bit different than the practice court, but I'm happy that I'm through and I'm gonna have more chances.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Just in terms of all of the adjustments you have been talking about wanting to make in advance of going step by step through this event, how pleased were you with kind of where you were in terms of string tension, movement, control, all that sort of stuff today?

IGA SWIATEK: Well, that was great, for sure. But, you know, I feel like my opponent played pretty differently than most of the players. That was pretty tricky, especially coming from Stuttgart where we played on kind of a surface where everything was, you know, lower.

But, you know, I need a couple of games to get used to that, and I would say technicalities and the rest of it we have it figured out, so we also see how the conditions in terms of whether gonna change here, but with my coach's experience, I think it's gonna be fine.

Q. A question if you could elaborate on the differences between the practice courts and the main court.

IGA SWIATEK: So the practice court, it's mostly like cement and a little bit of clay, and the clay is more like a powder.

On center court, underneath I feel like there is different kind of clay that is like more yellow, you know, the same on Roland Garros, I would say. So it's a little bit softer.

The slides are shorter. And the ball, I feel like it's bouncing more dynamically. But again, it's hard for me to say a lot, because my opponent, she played really high and different than, you know, the girls and the sparring partner that I played against on practices.

Q. This is a two-week tournament now, thereabouts. Just curious how you feel about now it's longer and the pros and cons of that.

IGA SWIATEK: Well, for sure, you know, after coming here from Stuttgart, it's nice to have a few more days off and a few more days to adjust during tournament, you know. But still, you have to be ready for that first match, and I don't think it's a lot of time between those tournaments to recover and kind of do a fresh start, you know.

I think it's going to be similar in Rome, so like physically I think it's tougher in that case that, you know, we still have to go on court on these days off and find the rhythm. If the tournaments were shorter, then we have more time in between to actually have like days off without even looking at a racquet, you know.

But I think, I don't know, honestly I haven't thought about that a lot. We will see maybe after the whole swing, maybe, yeah, we'll see. I don't know really.

For sure, you know, it would be nice to have a little bit longer breaks between maybe indoor and outdoor tournaments, but the season is tough to kind of make it all happen in these 52 weeks. Yeah.

Q. Do you think perhaps one or two of the differences and surprises as well today were because it was at night and I guess you practice in the day? Have you ever considered thinking, oh, my match is at night, maybe I could practice at night? Or has that never been a consideration?

IGA SWIATEK: Oh, yeah, we always do one session in the evening, but as I said, you know, I didn't have a lot of time here. Our main goal was just to spend as much time possible on the court. Doesn't matter what time.

But I thought that, you know, playing night session's going to be a little bit easier than day session, so I wasn't worried about that. Well, in second set I did the throw for my serve, and I was surprised how dark the sky was, so it was pretty stupid. But, yeah, playing at sunset, it's tricky, but in Indian Wells I had similar situation, so I'm using my experience.

Q. Just a quick question about the slide in particular on clay. Specifically the concept of sliding into the ball as opposed to just like sliding as a defensive maneuver and being balanced when you hit the ball. For you, when in your career did you learn that? Do you remember a coach telling you how to do it, or you just knew that...

IGA SWIATEK: I kind of knew.

Q. How?

IGA SWIATEK: I think when I was injured when I was 16 and I had surgery, then we focused when I was coming back to do sliding on both sides, because I stopped for a while.

That was the only thing honestly, because it was all natural for me (smiling). Yeah, I have never practiced that, I think.

Q. You're probably the best returner on the tour. Have you ever like experimented standing further back and what the challenges are of doing that?

IGA SWIATEK: Well, I have never experimented in that, because I think, you know, we have to be faster and more aggressive nowadays in tennis, so it didn't really make sense to do that.

But on clay you can stand a little bit further and you'll catch these balls even when they're wide, you know. Hmm, wait. No, but what was the other part?

Q. What the challenges would be of standing far back and trying to get back up to the baseline.

IGA SWIATEK: Oh, that's not a problem. I would say that you're not gonna kind of surprise your opponent with faster return. You have to put much more power to that return to make it the same speed.

So I don't know. I feel like I'm talking nonsense (smiling). Well, I think if I would stay more back, my split step would be higher and longer. I feel like I wouldn't have that much time to kind of react, you know. Yeah.

Q. Do you ever, before the serve, on the return, do you kind of have a premeditated idea, like are you thinking I'm gonna go for this? If so, does it depend on the situation in the match? Or are you just basically reacting every time to where the ball lands and how fast it is?

IGA SWIATEK: You mean I'm gonna go for one direction?

Q. Well, maybe you think, you know what? It's match point, I'm match point down or four match points down, I'm already in this hole, I'm just going to go for it on this return?

IGA SWIATEK: You mean like play as fast as possible and just risk --

Q. Just hit it as hard as you can.

IGA SWIATEK: Well, yeah, I do that sometimes. But still, if I would hit it as hard as I can, I would hit it to the stands, so can't really do that (smiling).

It's more about control and hitting it clean, like, you know, and like more precise, you know. But for sure, you know, when I'm playing against players who are really good servers, sometimes I'm kind of choosing the direction before, and it's tricky, but it depends on a feeling and intuition a little bit.