Rafael Nadal: 'It was difficult for me to take the routines'

The pandemic has affected every individual on the planet in one way or another. Spain was one of the countries most affected by COVID-19, so much so that it prevented world number 2 Rafael Nadal from leaving home and training for a few months. 19-time Grand Slam champion recently attended a summit conducted by former NBA champion Pau Gasol. The summit was held by videoconference and hosted various personalities from different sectors, including Fernando Alonso, Carolina Marin, Ryan Holliday, Nuria Roura, Ona Carbonell and Victor Kuppers. A few days before the lockdown was announced, the Majorcan phenomenon had beaten Taylor Fritz by winning the Acapulco Mexico Open. Initially, Rafa was taken aback by the emergency and took some time to adapt to the new situation. The former World number 1 has only trained on clay so far, a detail that suggests his willingness to skip the US Open to focus on Roland Garros.

Nadal on life in confinement

“Well, well, to be honest, because the first week also cost me a lot, the reality is that I completely lost the night hours... But of course I think that in the end we live a totally unprecedented situation for everyone and also with great general sadness" - Rafael Nadal explained. “Living with something that is totally new for everyone and obviously so negative I think that I personally was very affected by the first weeks," Rafael Nadal told Pau Gasol. "That is, it was difficult for me to take the routines. For us it is not an office job, so this (confinement) complicates it a little more" - he added. "As the weeks went by, so you can start to control a little daily guidelines of going to sleep at a certain time to get up to do a daily routine," Nadal said. "There are daily routines of getting up early at seven-thirty to go to train, I start training at 8, according to which, of course, it takes an hour. Obviously, in this type, I think it is also important to have objectives," Nadal elaborated. "Besides, the initiative was, I think, first, then necessary, second, I think that it was nice that so many people would join to help others, and third, because I think it also helped us all to have. It is also a daily occupation to know that we had to do a series of things to try to contribute to something more important" - Nadal concluded.

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/3fdcDCv