PETE ZIEBRON
9-time Grand Slam Champion Rafael Nadal. Charles Gabrean Photography
Rafael Nadal defeated #3 seed Novak Djokovic 6-4 5-7 6-4 6-2 at the US Open to win his 3rd consecutive Grand Slam and 9th in his career. More importantly, Nadal becomes the 7th man in history to complete the career Grand Slam.
In fact, the tennis record books have changed considerably since Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer have been collecting major titles during the last 3 years. Consider:
- 2008 Nadal wins Roland Garros & Wimbledon
- 2009 Federer wins Roland Garros & Wimbledon
- 2010 Nadal wins Roland Garros & Wimbledon
Prior to Nadal accomplishing the feat in 2008, it was last achieved by Bjorn Borg in 1978-1980.
- 2009 Federer completes career Grand Slam
- 2010 Nadal completes career Grand Slam
Andre Agassi became only the 5th man to win the career Grand Slam in 1999.
- 2010 Nadal wins 3 consecutive Slams in same calendar year: Roland Garros, Wimbledon & US Open
Rod Laver was the last to win 3 or more consecutive Slams in the same year when he won his 2nd true Grand Slam in 1969. (Note: Roger Federer and Pete Sampras also won 3 consecutive Slams, though not in the same year: Federer accomplished the feat twice in 2005-06 at Wimbledon, US Open & Australian Open and in 2006-07 at Wimbledon, US Open & Australian Open, Sampras once in 1993-94 at Wimbledon, US Open & Australian Open.)
Rafael Nadal also came close to becoming the first man in 50 years to win the US Open without dropping a set, however Djokovic was able to steady his game after a 117 minute rain delay and take the 2nd set 7-5.
Uncharacteristically, Nadal was only 4 of 23 in break point opportunities for the match early in the 4th set before successfully breaking Djokovic in 2 of his next 3 break points later in the set to help seal the victory. Meanwhile Djokovic was also able to break Nadal's serve all 3 times he had that opportunity in the first 2 sets. Nadal came into the match having been broken only twice in 91 service games.
The primary reason that Rafael Nadal was able to hold serve comfortably was the increased velocity of his serve due to a slight change in gripping of his racquet. Many times throughout the tournament, Nadal was crushing serves between 130-135 MPH, a full 10-15 MPH faster than in previous years in New York. As a result, he was able to depend on the bigger serve to win more free points, most notably when serving at 15-30, up 5-4 in the 3rd set. Nadal promptly hit 2 aces, painting the lines out wide to give himself set point and then delivered yet another serve that Djokovic stretched to touch but could not return. The improved and more lethal serve got Nadal out of potential trouble late in the 3rd set and Djokovic was only able to win 2 games the rest of the way.
At age 24, Rafael Nadal now owns: a Career Grand Slam, 9 Grand Slam titles, 3 Davis Cup Championships, 18 Masters 1000 titles, an Olympic Gold Medal, 42 career singles titles and a powerful serve that can be utilized to further demoralize the competition going forward.
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