Voices | Agassi and Graf: Pain and struggle are part of a tennis career

Photo: Oriental IC

The "exemplary love" between two tennis legends, Agassi and Graf, has long been praised by the world, and the two recently gave interviews to reflect on their careers as tennis players and to talk about the pressures they faced in the top of tennis. The two have won as many as 30 Grand Slam titles and have brilliant careers, but the two said that during this period as tennis players, glory was only a part of life, and they also had struggles and confusions.

"We're all going to struggle to a greater or lesser extent." "When you're holding a trophy in your hand, it looks like a perfect story, but the pain and struggle behind the championship makes both of us a little anxious," Agassi said. ”

Graf said that although the road to becoming a top player is difficult, the pressure she puts on herself in order to maintain her competitiveness at the top is unimaginable. "In the sport of tennis, every day you step on the court to push your limits." Graf said, "You find it sometimes difficult to find emotional balance, maybe physically you are ready, but on a psychological level you can't maintain the same mindset every day, every day to do your best, which is actually a very difficult thing." ”

Agassi has been studying tennis since he was 2 years old, and at the age of 16, he participated in his first professional tournament, and the focus of his life was only tennis from beginning to end, and he had no other choice, which he thought was unfavorable: "I think that because I had no other choice at that time, I was forced to work in the tennis industry and leave school life at a very young age, which made me completely disconnected from normal life. Agassi said.

Graff agrees with her husband's point of view, but on this basis she believes that this experience can also help you gain more experience and help you in your future retirement life: "It is true that we will face a lot of challenges in our careers, but I will say that this athlete experience will also be of great help to your future life. Ordinary people tend to slowly build their careers at the age of 28 or 30, and for us athletes, our careers are almost over. This is an experience that is different from ordinary people. ”

(Compilation/Faye Wong, Photo/Oriental IC)