Rafael Nadal and Casper Ruud train at Rafa Nadal Academy
A son of a former top-40 player Christian, the 19-year-old Casper Ruud has been one of the most promising youngsters from Scandinavia, almost entering the top-100 a year and a half ago and making a nice progress in 2018 as well to finish the year just outside the elite group. Back in August, Casper decided to make another big step in his development, moving to the Rafa Nadal Academy at Mallorca where he has the best possible team around him that will look upon his game and help him achieving big things in the years to come.
Ruud closed the season with three back-to-back semi-final runs at North American Challengers and he went back to Spain where he has been preparing for the new season before flying to Australia and kicking off the new season in Playford. World number 2 Rafael Nadal has returned to practice court a few days ago and he had some intense training sessions with the young Norwegian, pushing each other to the limits in order to get into the best possible shape before the start of 2019. This is a great chance for Casper to learn a lot from one of the most dedicated players on the Tour (they already had the opportunity to work here back in the past) and test his skills against the opponent who has been at the top of men's tennis for the last 13 years.
Nadal had a great year overall, winning the Tour leading five titles and 45 out of 49 matches he played but it wasn't enough to finish the season as the year-end number 1, struggling with knee, hip and abdomen injuries that forced him to miss the majority of the hard court tournaments in 2018 and also to close the year already after the semi-final loss against Juan Martin del Potro at the US Open when he retired with a knee injury. Ready to compete again, Rafa will work at his Academy before traveling to Abu Dhabi where he will play the Mubadala World Tennis Championship between December 27-29, heading to Brisbane after that to officially open his 2019 campaign.
from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2QE8rEv
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