INTERNAZIONALI BNL D'ITALIA

May 14, 2024

Taylor Fritz

Press Conference

T. FRITZ/G. Dimitrov

6-2, 7-6, 6-1

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Taylor. Anyone?

Q. How did you recover after that crazy tiebreak and come back and refresh for the third set?

TAYLOR FRITZ: I mean, I just had to forget about it. It's tougher to come back, I guess, if I feel like I missed a lot of opportunities, I played bad. Honestly, I played a very good tiebreaker the whole way through.

The one thing that was bothering me was the backhand second serve match point. I mean, I have to make that return, at the very least put it in the court. That was definitely something I could just, like, keep thinking about.

Yeah, I put it behind me and kind of accepted, Look, if I keep thinking about this and letting it bother me, all the things I could have done, should have done on that point with that shot, I'm probably going to just lose focus, play a bad game and lose the match.

I just moved on, forgot about it.

Q. I think I saw a stat that said you're the first U.S. man to make the quarterfinals or better at all three of the clay court Masters. What do you make of that accomplishment? What do you think has been most essential to getting more consistent on this surface?

TAYLOR FRITZ: Yeah, that's a really cool stat. I think for me, I've kind of committed to this clay court swing, playing all the events, for a long time. I think the generation before me, a lot of the Americans wouldn't want to play the whole swing or they skip Monte-Carlo, whatever.

For me, clay season's a huge part of the season. It's three Masters, some other tournaments, and a Grand Slam. How can I ever be a top player that I want to be if I can't produce some results during the clay season? 'Cause, like, I'm not that good where I'm going to dominate everywhere else. I always thought, like, if I want to be a top-10 player, I need to be putting results in on clay.

I've committed to playing the full swing several years of my career. I think I've just been kind of figuring out what works for me, using the parts of my game that work well on clay, kind of letting those parts of my game take over, whereas they might take a bit of a backseat when I'm playing on a hard court.

It's been really fun.

Q. This week Andy Murray showed up in Bordeaux with a Yonex racquet, which was quite a surprise. Have you ever made a big change to your setup, your racquet setup?

TAYLOR FRITZ: Sorry, what was that?

Q. Murray showed up at Bordeaux with a Yonex. Surprising. Have you ever made a big change to your setup, your racquet setup?

TAYLOR FRITZ: No. It's very interesting for me. My racquet's very, very light. So light that it's a little weird.

A long time ago when I was, like, 18 or 19, we put five grams to my racquet, which is like basically nothing. Then I had the worst year ever after that, the worst year I've ever had. I hated it. I went back.

Yeah, who knows what could be. You know what I mean? You change racquets, one shot feels better, one shot feels probably worse. I'm happy how everything feels for me, so I've never really been one to kind of tinker around with it.

I think maybe a bit over the years my tension's gone down a little, but that's about it.

Q. Could you imagine making such a big change mid-season?

TAYLOR FRITZ: If I felt like really something wasn't working, I needed something different, I wouldn't say I'd for sure make a change. Maybe then I'd be a bit more inclined to mess around with different weights and different whatever.

When things are going good, though, there's never any reason to mess with it.

Q. I have a question not regarding the game. I think you are pretty keen video game player. I had a question about, did you play tennis video games? If so, what's your feeling about it?

TAYLOR FRITZ: I mean, I've played the new Topspin. I was in it. I wanted to see it.

But no, I play video games to get away from tennis. Like, I want to play something. I mean, the thing is, I say it calms me down, but it's not really going to calm me down because it's very rage-inducing anyways.

I definitely don't want still to be doing tennis stuff when I'm away from the court.

Q. Do you have the same feelings as you have on the court?

TAYLOR FRITZ: Not necessarily. In order for me to have the same, like, feelings on court, same as feelings on court, I'd have to put more time into the video games.

At the end of the day, obviously I'm a tennis player, so video games are more for fun. I can sometimes notice when I'm feeling good on the court, thinking good, my mind's good, it will also transfer over to me playing well in a game (smiling).

Q. A different preparation this year for clay courts, thinking about that we will have Olympic Games at Roland Garros?

TAYLOR FRITZ: I mean, for me it's been the same. Start in Monte-Carlo and just try to play through.

It's a little awkward that we're going to go back to clay after grass obviously. I'm feel good on clay right now. It would work great for me if we were just going to continue on and play.

I'll probably just try to get there a bit early and get some reps in. After Wimbledon, I'm going to be coming off of a very, very long stint in Europe. I mean, I'm going to have to go home before coming back for the Olympics, so...

Obviously there is the option to play a clay court tournament after Wimbledon, before Olympics, but I don't think I can take that.