Marketa Vondrousova made history last month as the first unseeded woman to win Wimbledon in the Open Era when, ranked No. 42, the left-handed Czech stormed to seven wins—over five seeds, and two Top 10 players—to win her first Grand Slam title at the All England Club.
The low-key Czech, known prior to that point for her abundance of natural talent; hard luck with injuries; and eclectic mix of tattoos was thrust into a spotlight that naturally comes when you make history at tennis' oldest, and arguably most famous, tournament. Arriving back home in the Czech Republic, the 24-year-old said, was a culture shock.
"People are recognizing [me] more even in the city and everything," she said in Montreal, the first tournament she played after her major triumph. "For me, I don't like these kind of things to be seen this much."
But on the eve of the 2023 US Open, she admits, she finds herself adjusting more to the idea of the spotlight.
"I get bigger courts now, so that's a nice change," she said with a sheepish grin when asked Friday during the tournament's media day about what's different at a major tournament as a major champion.
"I practice here on the big courts. There's so many people watching the practice. ... It's nice to see the people just shouting at you, [they] want to do pictures and everything. I can feel it can be too much sometimes. But, yeah, so far, so good."
This time last year, Vondrousova couldn't have been further away from the US Open, both literally and figuratively. She was still recovering from wrist surgery—her second in four years—and was in fact sidelined from tennis from April to October. At one point this year, her ranking was in the triple digits.
But now? She comes to New York at a career-high world No. 9, firmly in the mix to feature deep into the second week. Vondrousova admitted her goal for the lead-up to the US Open was to "win some back-to-back matches," which she did: She reached the third round in Montreal, and the quarterfinals in Cincinnati.
In the US Open draw, she landed in a jam-packed third quarter led by No. 3 seed Jessica Pegula, whom Vondrousova defeated from a 4-1, break-points-down deficit in the third set of their quarterfinal match at Wimbledon.
The two could play in that round again here, but Vondrousova says it's not in her best interest to think that far forward.
"I feel like you just have to stay in your head and stay focused," she said. "It's definitely more pressure and more people are talking about you. I just want to enjoy the matches and we'll see what's going to happen.
"I feel like everybody's playing great. ... I have a little target on my back, so I just want to stay focused and just try to play my game and just hold my nerves."
Something in Vondrousova's favor? Her Cinderella run at the All England Club wasn't her first taste of a Grand Slam's latest stages. In 2019, she became the youngest woman to reach a major final in a decade when she reached the championship match at Roland Garros as an unseeded 19-year-old. Nine months prior to that, her first major breakthrough came in Queens when she reached the fourth round—her first time past the second round of a major.
And now that she's gone all the way once, who's to say she can't do it again?
"I never, like, want to think I can win another," she admitted. "I feel like it's just too much pressure for me if I think that, if I start think about it before tournament, or if I'm in the tournament.
"I just learned to keep the pressure off, tell myself it's just a tennis match, it's nothing else. I feel like that really helps me when I'm maybe down in my match or something. ... I don't know if it's a good thing or no, but it really helps me. I feel like for me it's a good sign."
