TMS - THE ERICSSON OPEN

March 21, 2001

Elena Bovina

ELENA BOVINA: I think for the first match it was pretty good. I mean, I started out well. It was fast. I mean, she wasn't really into the game first set so I took the opportunity and I won 6-1. Then I had some problems in the second set at the beginning because it got really windy and the ball was flying all over the court. But then I adjusted with the wind and, you know, I was leading 5-3 and 40-15. I mean, it's two matchpoints, so I kind of let the match go and she came back and 7-6. I mean, I'm happy that I pulled the match out.

ELENA BOVINA: No, I think I was more playing the ball over the net into the court but I was just waiting for her to make a mistake; that's why. But at this level of the tournament, the girls would never, you know, give a match like this. They would take all the opportunities. And she saw that I was waiting for her to make a mistake and to lose, you know, so she took the opportunity. She played well. But then I kind of, you know, I started to play aggressive tennis again and I won.

ELENA BOVINA: Well, hopefully I'll be playing, you know, as well as last week and I've been practicing hard, you know, for this tournament. So hopefully I'll do well here, but I mean, it wasn't like, you know, big thing or anything for me. I mean, I think that it's good that I played that well over there and I'm happy of course. But it's not that I'm gonna stop, you know, playing tennis because I achieved such a high level or whatever. So...

ELENA BOVINA: Me?

ELENA BOVINA: No. I don't think so because everyone in my family grew from 12 to 15, so these three years they grew and then they stopped. Me, the same. I grew after 15, I grew like this. I grew maybe 3 centimeters more then?

ELENA BOVINA: Yeah, I guess. 6'1", 6'2".

ELENA BOVINA: Yeah, of course.

ELENA BOVINA: I haven't heard -- I know that she had some knee problems over in Indian Wells. I know that these things happen. So I had a lot of problems with knees, too, when I was, you know, growing at this age from 12 to 15. And phew, I had a lot of problems not only with my knees but with elbows and ankles and all the stuff, really. Because you grow and the muscles, you know, they are still like tight. So they don't -- it's a long story, but believe me, you get some trouble with the knees for sure.

ELENA BOVINA: No. It's good that for now I think no problems. Because -- maybe because I stop growing. That's good.

ELENA BOVINA: I wasn't thinking too much about how am I doing. Of course I was just going out on the court every match and trying to do my best, you know, not to think, you know, of the result at the end, how I'm gonna reach the semifinals or the Finals, no. I was just going and playing, you know, every game, every match, you know, just trying to win this particular game. So... That's good that I wasn't thinking about the result, you know, like to reach the Finals or anything, no. Just playing whatever.

ELENA BOVINA: Yes, now I do.

ELENA BOVINA: In Moscow?

ELENA BOVINA: Yes, we have a lot of clay courts, yes. And hardcourts, too. So it's not a problem.

ELENA BOVINA: I don't know. Well, I like both. I like clay as much as I like hard. But I mean it's different, of course. It's just maybe because I won in Juniors, I won a lot of tournaments on clay courts. When I say that I like clay courts, some people don't believe me because, you know, I'm so tall and they think that, "Oh, it's probably so hard for you, you know, on the clay courts." But no. For me, I love clay courts because probably I was practicing a lot on the clay courts when I was little and I was playing a lot of tournaments. So...

ELENA BOVINA: Yes. He was a water polo player on the Russian team. They were actually second at the Olympic Games in Mexico. I don't remember which year it was.

ELENA BOVINA: I guess.

ELENA BOVINA: Yeah, well of course he was trying to, you know, to help me as much as he can. But he never was like, "Okay, you can't do this, you can't do that, you have to focus on your practice and on your tennis." No, of course he wasn't tough on me never, ever. I mean I think he was trying me mentally sometimes and physically, and every time when I had any problems he was there for me. So that's great. I mean, he probably -- he knew how to do it, how to help me the best, so that's good.

ELENA BOVINA: Well, actually they are two years older than me, so I'm not -- I never measure myself to anyone really because maybe in Juniors, you know, it was a big deal if you are young and you win everything. But here, I mean the age almost it doesn't matter, you know, because here, you know, the opponent, they don't look, you know, "Oh, she's young," or whatever. They just go out and try to beat you no matter how old are you or how, you know, good you are or how many tournaments you won in Juniors or whatever. They just play. So... I don't think that.

ELENA BOVINA: Sorry, again?

ELENA BOVINA: Yeah, uh-huh. We were friends since we were little, you know. We were playing Juniors, going there and there, you know, by ourselves. So we had to, you know, become friends because it would be like two girls from Russia and two boys from Russia and we would hang out together all the time and, you know, so of course now almost the same people are playing in the Tour who were playing Juniors. So of course we'll get along fine and we know each other very well. I mean, it wasn't like a problem or anything, so...

ELENA BOVINA: No. Well, actually not all of us. Lina Krasnoroutskaya, she's not even from Moscow, she's from Obninsk. That's a little bit further from Moscow but it's somewhere really not far away. But she never trains in Moscow. She's always back home, and I mean, no, we're in different places. We even -- we never practice together now. Just go and if we are at the same tournaments then, you know, maybe we hit. But like in Moscow, never. So...

ELENA BOVINA: Where?

ELENA BOVINA: Yeah, well, you know, I hit mostly -- I try to hit with guys partners. That's what everyone -- all of them do probably. And if I need to -- of course I need to hit some -- with girls, I mean I cannot hit the guy and go and play with the girl. It's different tennis. So I try to look for someone in Moscow, but it's very difficult to find somebody because everyone's always traveling at the tournaments, so you just, you know, take your book and find the telephone and you call okay, this one and this one and like for maybe two hours you try to find someone. And there's nobody, you know. And then you take a girl that's, I don't know, three years younger than you because you really don't care, you just need to see a girl on the opposite side. So, like, it ends with like a girl three years younger and she can't even hit the ball, so like, whatever. Who cares anyway?

ELENA BOVINA: Well, it's a good, yeah -- it's good. They have a lot of courts here and gym. I mean it's very good opportunity to improve your game. But I mean, for now, for this particular, you know, time, everything is perfect in Moscow for me. So there is no reason, you know, to go -- to come here and stay at the academy because really everything is good for me in Moscow now.

ELENA BOVINA: Well, we have indoors. I mean, it's not that we have only outside courts. We have indoors and we have a gym. You just have to pay for everything and it's a little -- it's trouble that Moscow is big and everything is so spread out that you have to -- you spend like two, three hours a day but only by driving, you know, because first you have practice in the morning then you have, you know, to go home and get some rest and then go back and practice and then go to do the physical stuff that's on the opposite side of Moscow. You drive in all the traffic. It's really hard sometimes, but I mean, it's good. You come here and everything is so easy here, you know. It's like, "Okay, here's the gym, here's the courts." So... But everything's pretty good for me in Moscow, so...

ELENA BOVINA: You mean tennis-wise?

ELENA BOVINA: You know, we try like a lot of girls from Russia will try to play aggressive tennis, but it's so different. I mean, the shots and just the tactics and the footwork. Everything is so different. But like the way that we'll play is aggressive. I think it's -- we have Petrova plays this way and Krasnoroutskaya, me, and Dementieva, she's more like, you know, she's in the middle somewhere. She can go and she can go back. So she's -- well, Kournikova, I think she's playing pretty aggressive. So I don't know why actually, not too many girls play just standing back on the baseline and hitting the lobs, no. Play more pretty much aggressive.

ELENA BOVINA: I was actually living in Morocco when I was little. My father was working in Russian embassy there. So my sister was playing tennis there. She's three years older than me. I was maybe four, three, three years -- four years old then. So she was practicing there every day, and I was just running and picking up the balls for her, you know, as a ball girl. The coach, he just asked, just try to play to hit a ball. I hit it with the backhand so good, like fled, just down the line. He's like, "Whoa, you should try." I'm like, okay. So since then.