THE CHAMPIONSHIPS

July 13, 2024

Harri Heliovaara

Henry Patten

Press Conference

HELIOVAARA-PATTEN/Purcell-Thompson

6-7, 7-6, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: Guys, quite an epic final. You're the men's doubles champions at Wimbledon. How are you feeling?

HARRI HELIOVAARA: What can you say? Can you dream of it? Maybe. Do you think it will happen? Probably not. But it has happened.

I feel joy, huge emotions. Tears of joy. It's unbelievable, that's what I can say.

HENRY PATTEN: It's completely surreal. Yeah, I mean, the most amazing thing about it is being there with family and friends, as I said on court, sharing it with them, those that have supported me for such a long time now. Most of them were there tonight, so...

Yeah, just overwhelming.

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. Can you encapsulate how much this moment has made your life change and your journey over the last three or four years?

HENRY PATTEN: Well, it certainly helps having the prize money. It means me and Harri can get into some bigger events coming up. That's like the serious tennis side.

I mean, in terms of, yeah, changing my life, we'll see. Like I said, I think the most important thing for me is to be able to share it with my family.

Q. You've won Wimbledon, but it's the way you did it. If you can start, explain a little bit.

HENRY PATTEN: I think my dad came up to me and said, That was like a bank robbery, which is harsh but fair. It seemed like we were always down. First set tiebreak, 6-1 down. Clawed back. Lost second set tiebreak. We were 5-2 down, lucky net cord, pretty good return, but pretty lucky at the same time. Clawed it back.

Mini breaks down in the third set tiebreak. Didn't get near to their serves all match. Yeah, blew open the doors and ran away with the trophy at the end of it basically.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: What was question (laughter)?

Q. You have the title, but the way you did it.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: Yeah, the whole two weeks, we had a thing going on. After the first round we said to each other, coach Calvin, we reminded, Five to go, four to go, three to go, two to go, one to go. Now there's no more matches to go. It's surreal.

Same with the final. The opponents, if I'm not mistaken, they had three match points, one with them serving. You don't often win that kind of match.

If you once want to get a little lucky, Wimbledon final is a good match to get lucky. I think we did. Bank robbery is not far away from truth.

Q. The ramifications of this is you could maybe get to Davis Cup at some stage, ATP Tour finals, maybe Olympics in four years. If you carry on this trajectory, you could open up a lot of doors. That is exciting for you?

HENRY PATTEN: Yeah, massively exciting. I think hopefully we'll get a spot in Turin with that win, potentially get a qualifying spot if you win a slam depending on a few things.

Yeah, I'll be mega keen to represent my country. Obviously we have a lot of very strong doubles.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: Finland against Great Britain is the next Davis Cup, so I'm very much looking forward to that (laughter).

HENRY PATTEN: Yeah.

Q. (No microphone.)

HENRY PATTEN: I would.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: We were very close to playing each other in the mixed. I lost my first round, so we never met.

HENRY PATTEN: We'll have to see. There are lots of very established players. Obviously when it comes to Davis Cup stuff, it's quite political, as well.

We'll see. I haven't even thought about those conversations yet. Leon will say, Well done. If I hear more from him, great. If not, then that's kind of the way it goes. We'll see.

Q. I'm guessing sort of growing up, you dream of winning slams, in particular Wimbledon. What does it feel like to do it?

HENRY PATTEN: Again, I don't know what to do with myself, to be honest. I don't know. I don't have words for what I'm feeling right now. I think that's probably amplified, again, by the way we won that match.

Yeah, I'm exhausted emotionally and physically, for sure. Yeah, maybe ask me in a few days (smiling).

Q. How are you going to celebrate tonight?

HENRY PATTEN: How much time have you got? Well, I've got all my family. My whole family are here. I have my college coach, who flew over. I've got three guys who flew over, old college teammates. Everyone.

Yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing. Old high school friends were here. Yeah, the list goes on. To be able to share it with them, that is what is the most special to me is all of these people that have impacted me on my journey at different stages, in different ways, in different amounts.

But just being able to share it with them and, yeah, have a nice glass of champagne. It's fun.

Q. Ipswich tweeted some messages of support. How much does that mean to you?

HENRY PATTEN: Yeah, it's cool. If they want to get behind me, I'm all for it. Yeah, it's cool.

Q. You had been at Wimbledon dealing with numbers. Can you talk about that time? We saw you pretty emotional. What was going on through your mind at that point?

HENRY PATTEN: My first job at Wimbledon was doing the stats for IBM, which I guess got me familiar with the grounds. It might have given me some advantage. I don't know. It feels like a long time ago now. It was basically a summer job for two weeks. It paid pretty well, but it was hard work.

It's nice. I saw Helen Weal the other day, who runs it. Bumped into her and said, Hello. Don't get me wrong, I'm quite glad I'm playing now instead of doing the stats for them. Yeah, it was a good experience.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: It's a special tournament, obviously. If I quickly summarize my journey here, I stopped playing when I was 23. I didn't play for five years.

Before that, I had achieved to play in the quallies of Wimbledon in the singles. I won one match in singles quallies. I thought that was very special. Very proud of that.

My uncle who was here today, I was working also in other jobs. For example, working for Finnish Tennis Federation. He asked for tickets to Wimbledon 10 years ago. I came here as a tourist with him. I realized there are many friends of mine playing the doubles.

I think that's one of the reasons that I started playing again, the trip to Wimbledon almost 10 years ago, after a five-year gap. Never thought I'd be here. I was dreaming of being a top-100 player in doubles, maybe making it a career. Never thought it would be this good.

Can be proud of that.

Q. When you got together in April, did you set specific goals?

HENRY PATTEN: We said, Grand Slam champs in three months or it's over. Luckily we can stick together now (smiling).

HARRI HELIOVAARA: Your coach Calvin said our goal is to be in the ATP 1000s in August. I thought that's quite bold. We managed that after the quarterfinals I think. I didn't think anyone expected us to win the Grand Slam so soon. Maybe one day, but...

It's been a dream. A dream team, what can you say?

Q. Did your coach Calvin have tickets for Suede tonight?

HENRY PATTEN: Yeah, he did, in Leeds.

Q. What time?

HENRY PATTEN: He's not there (laughter).

No, we were having breakfast this morning. That was the first time he brought it up. He said, I booked tickets up in Leeds, a concert.

Yeah, sorry, Calvin. But he's here.

Q. (Indiscernible.)

HENRY PATTEN: You'd think he'd be fully invested in this, but obviously not (smiling).

Q. How will you celebrate?

HENRY PATTEN: I don't know.

Q. How do you want to celebrate? Meal? Restaurant?

HENRY PATTEN: I think there's a gala we have to go to. I don't know anything about that yet. That will be nice. Then I don't know. Have a few drinks tonight.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: Unfortunately, my two kids are falling asleep already.

HENRY PATTEN: That sucks.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: I'd love to celebrate with them. I can do it tomorrow.

I have to say that my second child turns one today. He's the reason I didn't play Wimbledon last year, but I think I'll take it.

HENRY PATTEN: That's awesome.

Q. You will never forget this day.

HARRI HELIOVAARA: No, never forget this day, no.

Q. And you worked at Helsinki Airport?

HARRI HELIOVAARA: I worked at an airport for a year, after I finished my first career, worked at an airport with my wife there. I studied. I worked as a management consultant, some private equity internships.

I think this gives me better feelings. Excel sheets in an office can't compare to this.

Q. Henry, you're only the third British man since the war to win this title. What does that make you feel?

HENRY PATTEN: It's bizarre. It is bizarre for me because I would have said I probably wasn't prepared to win this tournament. It's only the second time I've played it. Yeah, I mean, that's a crazy stat.

I idolized Johnny Marray and Neal Skupski last year. To join them as Wimbledon champions is phenomenal. That's a nice step to have.

Q. You said you didn't have super high expectations going into the tournament. Was there a moment where you thought you could win it?

HENRY PATTEN: I think we had high expectations for ourselves in terms of our performances. We had a difficult draw first round. We knew that.

Yeah, I wouldn't have said that we had low expectations going into the tournament. I think we had pretty high expectations on ourselves, to be honest, to perform and play the best we can. Whether we'd win or not, we weren't sure.

Yeah, I think we're both ambitious. We both like to win and we're both very competitive in that way. I wouldn't say we had high expectations or low expectations. I think we just thought we believed we could beat whoever we played throughout. That counted for a lot.

Q. Do you feel this could be the start of a special, long-term partnership in the doubles?

HARRI HELIOVAARA: I really hope so. We even talked to each other earlier that, This is working, let's stick together. I can go with him for the rest of my career, and I wouldn't complain.

No, it's something special. We're so close to each other on the court. It's something I don't think I've ever experienced that before. If I can use the word 'safe space'. Henry gives me so much trust. He never blames me. That's when you trust.

It's a very good peak performance state of mind where we end up together. There can be difficult moments on the court, but we somehow know that staying together, good things will happen. That's a special feeling, and that's why in doubles you're often searching for the right guy. I think we have been very lucky to find each other.

HENRY PATTEN: Yeah, I don't have much more to add to that really.

I think we have similar values and that shows in how we play tennis and how we are off the court as well. I think that allows us to have a really close relationship on the court.

For example, it helps us to dig out matches like tonight. It would have been easy to kind of roll over. They were, I would say, playing better than us for most of the match. But knowing we are there with each other and we are going to fight to the end. That's it. Whether we win or lose, it's okay.

Yeah, it's definitely pretty cool, pretty special.