Roger Federer is on the floor doing push-ups and I’m in awe.
It’s not his form, not his show of strength, that impresses. I’ve been watching the Swiss superstar do the undoable for more than a decade-and-a-half, since, in his Nike all-whites, he stunned Pete Sampras in their one and only encounter at the All England Club, falling to his knees in tears and disbelief.
The BBC’s play-by-play man that mid-summer afternoon in 2001 informed us:
Sampras has lost like a champion in a fabulous match, but maybe the baton in tennis has been passed to a new generation. Federer can hardly believe it. The emotion of the moment, having beaten the greatest grass-court player of all time, is too much for him. Nineteen years of age, his first-ever appearance on the Centre Court of Wimbledon, he has played a magnificent match to defeat the seven-times champ in five extraordinary sets…
Now it’s 2017, 16 years and 18 major titles later, and he is doing push-ups with an eager-beaver bunch of second-graders from the Gerald Ford Elementary School in Indian Wells, Calif., and it hits me: This is his appeal, right up there with the balletic grace; the sweeping forehand; the unflustered, in-match cool; the record Grand Slam count; the unequaled 237 consecutive weeks at No. 1, those thrilling ‘Fedal’ epics, et al.
Here is an athlete with brandable-and-bankable global fame, who plugs everything from espresso machines to private jets, with legions of ‘RF’ hat-wearing devotees who cling to chain-link fences for hours just to catch one glimpse of him on the practice courts, in a mock-press-conference-turned-workout-session full of runny-nose grade schoolers, treating the proceedings as if there is no place he would rather be.
“How strong are you?” asks one earnest student, her hair in a ponytail.
“Maybe I’m stronger than you, I think,” offers Federer before, unprompted, adding, “Who wants to show me two push-ups? Alright, we’ll do a group push-up.”
If you’re in the promotion business, you know this is the unscripted stuff of PR gold. But it was just another day in the life of the polyglot philanthropist Federer. It was just part of the process, one that he genuinely seemed to enjoy from the moment he transitioned from promising-but-temperamental Basel-ite to transcendent record-setter. It was a process he seemed to enjoy even until last week, when he announced his retirement, his late-career injuries having quashed any remaining hopes of a return to the tour. The travel, the training, the pressers, the hotels, the signature-seekers, all the demands that came with the job, he embraced it all.
Between 2004 and 2010, Federer would collect 14 of his 20 major championships, perhaps the most dominant stretch the game has ever seen. That run would include five-year sweeps at both Wimbledon and the US Open, 23 straight major semifinals, and a 41-match win streak. Three times he was a Roland Garros title away from the calendar-year Grand Slam.
There are so many indelible performances: His domination of Lleyton Hewitt in the title match at the 2004 US Open, when he hung not one but TWO bagels on the fiery Aussie. His 16-14-in-the-fifth marathon against American Andy Roddick in the 2009 Wimbledon final, a four-hour, 17-minute triumph that helped him reclaim the No. 1 ranking. When he turned the tables on career-long rival Rafael Nadal in the 2017 Australian Open final, returning from injury to prevail despite being down a break in the fifth set. Even his 6-4, 6-4, 6-7(5), 6-7(8), 9-7 loss to Nadal in the 2008 Wimbledon finale, a match that in many minds eclipsed the Borg vs. McEnroe War of 18-16 as the greatest ever played.
All were classics, yes. But you didn’t need a final to see Federer at his best.
New Yorkers will remember his quarterfinal matchup with Frenchman Gael Monfils at the US Open in 2014. Monfils came out on fire, grabbing a commanding two-sets-to-love advantage over the then-world No. 3. He had Federer on the ropes. But if you watched them during the changeover between the second and third sets, it was a tale of two very different competitors. Monfils was a bundle of nerves, jittery in his chair with the task of closing out the Swiss maestro heavy on his mind; Federer, meanwhile, was as calm, cool and collected as can be, even two sets down knowing good and well he would work his way back into the match.
He stormed back, of course, saving two match points in the process, to win, 4-6, 3-6, 6-4, 7-5, 6-2. Like those signs read: SHHH!! QUIET! GENIUS AT WORK.
“He is never tired,” observed Monfils afterward.
After falling to Federer in the 2005 US Open final, 6-3, 2-6, 7-6(1), 6-1, Andre Agassi was asked to compare Federer to his archrival Sampras: “Pete was great. I mean, no question. But there was a place to get to with Pete. You knew what you had to do. If you do it, it could be on your terms. There’s no such place like that with Roger.”
When Sampras retired in 2003, his last act a 14th major at Agassi’s expense in Flushing Meadows, the prevailing wisdom was that his record-book achievements would stand for decades to come, maybe even forever. Little did we know that three players—Federer, Nadal and Novak Djokovic—would come along and eclipse him in the same generation. And it seems apropos now that Federer would say farewell to the sport only days after a 19-year-old kid from Murcia, Spain, Carlos Alcaraz, claimed not only his first major but the world No. 1 ranking, the baton perhaps passed once more.
Federer now sits third on the all-time Slams list behind his Big Three brethren: 22, 21, 20. But there are many who, no matter what the numbers say, will always see him as the GOAT. That’s just the kind of impact he has had: his beautiful game, his persona away from the court, permanently positioning him above all-comers.
Back in 2019, I asked Federer about the concept of perfection, since he, more than any player I had ever encountered, seemed to personify it. Was it attainable? He was the guy in the throwback, monogrammed cream blazer, after all, who would come off the court after five sets of all-out warfare, not a hair out of place, no sign of sweat on his brow. Mirka and the kids seated courtside, watching daddy do his thing. Skipping seamlessly from English to Swiss German to French in his post-match chats with the gathered media.
“People always elevate superstar athletes to superman status,” he said. “Then you get to meet us and you realize, ‘He’s just another normal guy. It just so happens he does great in what he does.’ I don’t see myself like that. Being perfect doesn’t exist.”
Here we had put Federer on a pedestal all these years, when all along he was just a regular guy, albeit a supremely gifted one, happy to get down on the floor with the rest of us.
