Rafael Nadal, in peace after a sweet withdrawal | ATP Tour

Roland Garros

Nadal, in peace after a sweet withdrawal

Spanish reflects on how the process of hanging the racket has been

May 26, 2025

Will Rafael Nadal tell your son what he got as a tennis player? Will you explain how the Cup of Mosqueteros de Roland Garros conquered 14 times? How did you raise 22 Grand Slam titles? How did you build a legend career as very few have seen the history of tennis? No, of course not. It is clear. There is no doubt about that.

“If I am sincere, nor do I have any illusion that I understand it or know, although obviously he will know,” said the 22 Grand Slam titles champion after the emotional tribute he received on Sunday at the Philippe Chatrier by Roland Garros. “I will not be the one to explain it. I am not this type of father or person, sincerely. I am not a person who used to talk a lot about me. I do not usually talk much about what I have achieved and what I have not achieved,” he continued.

“I always returned home and tried to act in a normal way, not to mention whether things had been very good or very bad,” said Mallorcan. “So much less make my son believe that his father was a phenomenon in something. I tell him whenever I am a ‘potato’, and I try not to see me at all as a person who has been someone. Because I really do not consider myself as such. I have been an important athlete within the history of sport for things that have been achieved, like the 14 Roland Garros,” he recalled. “Obviously it is not necessary to be humble in that. It is reality, the numbers are the numbers. But beyond that, I have no interest in my son to see me as such.”

This is Nadal as always, that of a lifetime, humble and sensible; With the feet on the floor. A Nadal who will turn 39 on June 3, and has been retired since last November, when he hung the racket because his body forced him to do it, and not because he had reached a point of no return with tennis. Not much less.

“I did not end up tired of tennis,” reflected the Balearic. “I finished my sports career loving tennis, but I reached a point where my body could not anymore. This is reality: it has not been a mental issue, but my body did not allow me to continue doing what I had done during all these years and that’s why I closed a stage of my life,” the Spanish continued.

“As I am not a person with a great ego, I live well on a day to day in anonymity,” he added. “Although tennis has been a very important part in my life during all these years, I always had a life beyond tennis. I had the intuition that when I arrived that day, the day of the withdrawal, the transition would be sweet if I was convinced and satisfied with all the effort I had made during my career,” he said. “And so has been. It’s real. I’m fine, happy, enjoying other things.”

That is demonstrated in a daily gesture that does not raise ampoules: sitting in front of television to watch tennis. Because Nadal continues to see tennis, and that does not generate frustration or other negative emotions.

“I keep seeing tennis from time to time and it doesn’t hurt me to see Rome, Montecarlo or Barcelona, ​​and it will not make me see Roland Garros,” he confessed. “It is a book that has closed and now it is time to move on to a new stage. And really, when you finish this stage you already forget the rivalries, you forget if one or the other wins. Before, maybe I did not want to win Novak [Djokovic]. Really, now I don’t care. I don’t care who wins, “Mallorcan insisted.” I enjoy tennis. I prefer that the people I know, by relationship, and people from my country win. But if Novak wins Roland Garros, a hair is not going to bother me. Four years ago I would have preferred not to happen, but I am in a new stage of my life. ”

During his stage as a player in the circuit, the Spanish was fully submerged in a fierce fight for the most important titles in the world with Roger Federer, Andy Murray or Djokovic himself, among others. Consequently, he looked sideways at the results of his great rivals in the race for being the best. I was calculated. I was aware of what they got and others. That has now been forgotten. There is no matter.

In full 2025, happily retired, Nadal is at peace and ready to embrace the new challenges that life offers.