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INTERVIEW WITH MARTINA NAVRATILOVA on WIMBLEDON
Member of the Laureus World Sports Academy
Material on the Laureus website is available for media use free of charge provided full credit is given, for example…”Martina Navratilova speaking on the Laureus website”
Q - The big story in tennis this year is the retirement of Justine Henin. Did that surprise you? Do you think it has changed the face of women’s tennis?
She’s No 1, and she did it playing great tennis. To me, she was just going to hit her peak. I didn’t think she had got there however good a year she had last year. She was just hitting her stride as a tennis player, becoming a much better all around player, coming to the net more and hitting shots from all over the court. I thought ‘now we’re going to see the cream of the crop, her being the best.’
But that had done her physically and done her mentally, and I was shocked, as was the rest of the world [when she retired]. But I think [it is exhausting] to play the type of tennis that she plays, which is very all-encompassing, very emotional, very passionate and she has to work so hard because she is 5ft 5ins and everyone else has got five, ten inches on her. So she has to work so hard, and there is such a fine line between being 100% and being just a bit less, and when you’re just that little bit less – with the kind of tennis she plays – you just can’t cut it anymore. It’s too hard, so I understand it [her retirement], but I was so looking forward to watching her play.
Q Do you see someone ready to replace Henin?
Justine was ahead for the last ten months, but if you think of just this year it was a pretty even run. You have Serena Williams, Justine Henin and Maria Sharapova, so it was a pretty open field who was going to be No 1 at the end of the year, with Sharapova having a slight edge. So I think it’s wide open now, even more so. So it will be interesting to see who turns out to be No 1. It’s been a wide open field for the women for the last five or six years.
Q - Do you see any exciting new names coming through who will have a big future?
I think Ana Ivanovich is a superstar in the waiting. She’s beautiful, drop dead gorgeous and a great personality and she’s got the game to back it up, so I think now she comes through in a Slam - watch out Maria! Here comes another superstar which might actually eclipse her.
It’s great. I think women’s tennis is in great shape. I think we have some fun personalities. They all play a little too similar for me, that’s why I’m mourning Justine’s retirement because she had a different game. Svetlana Kuznetsova comes close to that. She can mix it up, she’s more of an all-around player who can come to the net, but overall they’re just banging from the baseline, and they’re so strong they don’t need to come to the net. When Sharapova first came out, they thought she was just another Anna Kournikova; pretty but won’t win. And… she won. She won Wimbledon when she was 17 years old, and really surprised everybody and then she won the US Open a few yeas later, and won the Australian Open this year. She’s on track to be the youngest to win all four Slams and it’s only been done by four, maybe five people before her. It’s quite a feat and it’s only been done by a few guys and a handful of women, so it really puts you up there in tennis history, so she’ll be gunning for it.
Q - Do you think if Justine Henin hadn’t retired, and with the extra desire, she would have won Wimbledon this year?
It’s too bad that Justine didn’t find it in her heart or in her soul to find the passion for just a couple of months to win Wimbledon, because she would have been just one of a handful of women to win all four Grand Slams, and it’s the one she’s never won.
Yet to me it seems that her game is the best suited to grass compared to everybody else, she can serve volleys, she can come to the net, she has that sliced backhand, moves so well. Power does not play as well on grass as it does on the other surfaces, yet it is the only one she’s never won. Last year was her best chance, but she got nervous and fell in the semis. So, it’s too bad she didn’t stick around for a few more months. I think her game would have been better for it. Now she’s not there.
Q – Is Wimbledon more nerve-racking than any other tournament?
No, not necessarily. I think you can get nervous any time, when something means so much to you, you can’t breathe. Because Justine never won that before, perhaps it got to her. And you look at what Amelie Mauresmo has been doing at the French Open. She’s come as favourite a couple of times, but she’s never won it, and I think if she wasn’t French she’d have won it by now. No matter what you do, you never get over it because you want it so badly. There’s a fine line between wanting it and wanting it too badly. But, yes, nerves always get in the way, and that just means you care, you know?
It’s how you handle it, and for the most part, Justine was a total champion and handled it beautifully, but sometimes something just means too much and Roger Federer, if he gets close to winning, it will be interesting to see how he holds up. Guys choke just as much as the women, especially at Wimbledon. I think that Wimbledon makes you choke more than anywhere else though. I’ve seen [Boris] Becker and [Stefan] Edberg practically trying to give the Championship away to each other. But, it’s what happens when you care so much.
Q – There is a perception that the Williams sisters have a special place at Wimbledon?
Grass favours a big serve and the best athletes, and the Williams sisters are the best athletes, along with Justine Henin. Pete Sampras was the best athlete in men’s tennis, just as Roger Federer is now, and I was up there with Steffi Graff - and we could adapt because you get the irregular bounces on grass, and the best athletes can see that and pick it up and adapt to that.
Venus comes to another level when she plays on grass. Last year she did it, three years ago she did it again. She was nowhere to be seen all year and then as soon as Serena is out of the tournament, Venus starts playing like a different person. And the surface can do that to you. Sometimes clay can give someone confidence, or make you fall apart and grass can do that do you too. And the Williams sisters thrive because they are the best athletes.
Q - Do you have a favourite to win Wimbledon?
The Williams sisters will be hard to beat on grass. And on the men’s side, I’d have to go for Roger [Federer], but with [Novak] Djokovic being such a close third, whichever guy [Federer or Nadal] has him in their half of the draw, it will make a big difference because they have to beat the other guy and Djokovic. That’s a lot. It means the other guy’s rested and probably didn’t have such a hard semi-final and it can be the deciding factor.
Q- Laureus is ten years old next year. Where is Laureus today? What are its achievements?
Well, it’s hard to imagine it’s been ten years… that it’s been going on that long. When you start, it’s hard to know how things are going to turn out. We now have over 60 projects worldwide, in over 40 countries. When we started out, we thought ‘maybe we can do this’, but it’s grown actually more than we thought and the brand Laureus is pretty strong now around the world, even people in America are paying attention.
I think it’s exponential. It keeps growing and growing and I’m very excited about what we’ve been able to achieve so far, but of course there’s so that much more work to do.
Q - One reason it’s been so successful is that great sportsmen and women like yourself have been involved and want to give something back to society.
I think we athletes always try to give back to our sport, and to sport in general because our sport has given us such a great life. It’s like we almost feel guilt – and need to give something back, and most of all it’s about giving opportunities to youngsters. We had our opportunity somehow and made it happen and it’s just a shame when kids want to [do the same] but the chances are not there for them, so it’s great we can do that.
Q - You’ve obviously found this a moving experience. So many children have had their lives improved by the Laureus experience.
It’s unbelievable. The numbers are astonishing, especially in the Third World countries where the dollar and the pound, or the pound and the euro go a lot further, so much further there where you can affect kids in a positive way, whereas you do these projects here – I mean we have projects everywhere, in England, in the States – but when you go to Asia or Africa that’s when you can make a difference to thousands and thousands of kids, that’s amazing. Not that they will become professional athletes, but just to have the opportunity to learn how to be healthier, to have fun, to learn skills that will work for them for the rest of their lives is very empowering and very humbling.
INTERVIEW WITH MARTINA NAVRATILOVA on YOUNG PLAYERS
Member of the Laureus World Sports Academy
Material on the Laureus website is available for media use free of charge provided full credit is given, for example…”Martina Navratilova speaking on the Laureus website”
Q – Of the current top 20 in the world, 13 are from Eastern Europe. This is very different from your day when you had to leave Czechoslovakia to expand your game by moving to the United States, but what’s the difference between then and now?
I think in the former Communist countries now there are more opportunities for women and girls to compete and to play tennis, so I think you’ll keep continuing this trend. We had good athletes - Slavs are good athletes - but we didn’t have the opportunities. Now we do. I think they’re very hungry. The Brits and the Europeans not so much, but the Brits and Americans have gone soft. They’ve gone soft. It’s too easy for them. It’s too easy, you know. Your Mum drives you everywhere. You have all these schedules and all this support, and they get distracted because they have got too many opportunities, so they don’t really stick with something for very long. The kids from the Third World countries and the former Soviet Republics are just hungrier.
Q - People always say if only we had more facilities, things would be better for our tennis players, especially in the UK. Do you agree with that?
It’s not about lack of facilities. You get Ana Ivanovic, who played on an empty swimming pool. They put a net across it, emptied it so she could play indoors. I played, coming up in Czechoslovakia, in Prague. We had three indoor courts in the whole country, which fortunately were in Prague, so I was able to play. But I played once a week until I was 12-years-old, when I then played twice a week for an hour, so it wasn’t a case of me being on the court for four hours a day, but I really wanted to play. These kids, they really want to play – [like Novak] Djokovic, they live it. They just play tennis. They don’t play baseball in the winter, then football in the summer and tennis as filler in-between. They are committed to the sport. And the same in England, the facilities are there – that’s not the problem.
Q - Does this mean that you will start to see more developing world players?
Yes, I think you will see more players, especially from China, if they have the opportunities. Because tennis is an Olympic sport, the Chinese Government has got behind it, so you will see more and more players from China playing, and the next wave will be coming out of Africa.
There’s no question, they are great athletes, they just don’t have the opportunities. Once those courts are being built, they’ll have more opportunities, more schools, more places, more coaching. You will start seeing more kids coming from that part of the world.
Q- Laureus is ten years old next year. Where is Laureus today? What are its achievements?
Well, it’s hard to imagine it’s been ten years… that it’s been going on that long. When you start, it’s hard to know how things are going to turn out. We now have over 60 projects worldwide, in over 40 countries. When we started out, we thought ‘maybe we can do this’, but it’s grown actually more than we thought and the brand Laureus is pretty strong now around the world, even people in America are paying attention.
I think it’s exponential. It keeps growing and growing and I’m very excited about what we’ve been able to achieve so far, but of course there’s so that much more work to do.
Q - One reason it’s been so successful is that great sportsmen and women like yourself have been involved and want to give something back to society.
I think we athletes always try to give back to our sport, and to sport in general because our sport has given us such a great life. It’s like we almost feel guilt – and need to give something back, and most of all it’s about giving opportunities to youngsters. We had our opportunity somehow and made it happen and it’s just a shame when kids want to [do the same] but the chances are not there for them, so it’s great we can do that.
Q - You’ve obviously found this a moving experience. So many children have had their lives improved by the Laureus experience.
It’s unbelievable. The numbers are astonishing, especially in the Third World countries where the dollar and the pound, or the pound and the euro go a lot further, so much further there where you can affect kids in a positive way, whereas you do these projects here – I mean we have projects everywhere, in England, in the States – but when you go to Asia or Africa that’s when you can make a difference to thousands and thousands of kids, that’s amazing. Not that they will become professional athletes, but just to have the opportunity to learn how to be healthier, to have fun, to learn skills that will work for them for the rest of their lives is very empowering and very humbling.
INTERVIEW WITH MARTINA NAVRATILOVA on LAUREUS
Member of the Laureus World Sports Academy
Material on the Laureus website is available for media use free of charge provided full credit is given, for example…”Martina Navratilova speaking on the Laureus website”
Q- Laureus is ten years old next year. Where is Laureus today? What are its achievements?
Well, it’s hard to imagine it’s been ten years… that it’s been going on that long. When you start, it’s hard to know how things are going to turn out. We now have over 60 projects worldwide, in over 40 countries. When we started out, we thought ‘maybe we can do this’, but it’s grown actually more than we thought and the brand Laureus is pretty strong now around the world, even people in America are paying attention.
I think it’s exponential. It keeps growing and growing and I’m very excited about what we’ve been able to achieve so far, but of course there’s so that much more work to do.
Q - One reason it’s been so successful is that great sportsmen and women like yourself have been involved and want to give something back to society.
I think we athletes always try to give back to our sport, and to sport in general because our sport has given us such a great life. It’s like we almost feel guilt – and need to give something back, and most of all it’s about giving opportunities to youngsters. We had our opportunity somehow and made it happen and it’s just a shame when kids want to [do the same] but the chances are not there for them, so it’s great we can do that.
One of the reasons Laureus works is because we do have superstars as members [of the Academy] and the reasons we’re all there is for the same reason. There is no one who is bigger than Laureus; the Academy is bigger than just one member and that’s what makes it all work. So we all do what we can and are making a difference to kids around the world.
Q - Recently you did make a difference to a lot of kids in Kenya when you visited the Mathare Youth Soccer Association. What did that mean to you?
I’ve spent a lot of time in Kenya over the last few years – I spent around six months there over the last ten years. I really love the people, love the country, it’s got so much to offer. But that was my first time to a slum and, boy, it really knocks you out. To see the people dressed to the nines, going out to work but living in such squalid conditions and most of all the kids playing in the dirt and playing in the trash, just breaks your heart so you wonder what you can do apart from taking pictures. I went to the library [at MYSA] and, a small thing, they had all these National Geographic issues from the sixties until 2003 and I said ‘what happened?’ and they said ‘we couldn’t get the last four years’. So when I got back to the States, I found the last four years of National Geographic and sent them over to them. You know, it’s a small thing. I don’t care if they know who sent it to them. I enjoy reading it myself, so it’s nice the kids have the same opportunity.
Q - You’ve obviously found this a moving experience. So many children have had their lives improved by the Laureus experience.
It’s unbelievable. The numbers are astonishing, especially in the Third World countries where the dollar and the pound, or the pound and the euro go a lot further, so much further there where you can affect kids in a positive way, whereas you do these projects here – I mean we have projects everywhere, in England, in the States – but when you go to Asia or Africa that’s when you can make a difference to thousands and thousands of kids, that’s amazing. Not that they will become professional athletes, but just to have the opportunity to learn how to be healthier, to have fun, to learn skills that will work for them for the rest of their lives is very empowering and very humbling.
INTERVIEW WITH MARTINA NAVRATILOVA on ART
Member of the Laureus World Sports Academy
Material on the Laureus website is available for media use free of charge provided full credit is given, for example…”Martina Navratilova speaking on the Laureus website”
Q - Do you miss playing?
I loved playing when I was playing and I love doing what I’m doing now. So, I could still play tennis if I wanted to, but you have to give up the rest of your life and I have too many things which I’m enjoying doing now. So, I basically quit last year, because I wanted to do other things.
Q – I believe you are very much into Art at the moment?
I hooked up with a Slovak artist, Juraj Kralik, who came to me eight years ago. He had this idea of painting with tennis balls, so we do sculpting pieces and paintings on clay as well as hard canvas with tennis balls and we’ve been doing it now for seven years, and have had exhibitions.
If you go on my website, you can check it out. We’re getting more and more abstract now with the creations and it’s a lot of fun.
It’s called Art Grand Slam and for the most part we dip tennis balls in paint and hit them onto a canvas, either as you would on court, so the imprint is long, or bounce them, or hit them against the wall to create different splatters.
And we’ve been using the bigger, autograph balls to create a bigger splatter with different colour paints and we do different designs like a tennis net and you hit balls over the net.
I don’t claim to be an artist, but the pieces have got a good artistic acclaim, so… check it out.
Q- Laureus is ten years old next year. Where is Laureus today? What are its achievements?
Well, it’s hard to imagine it’s been ten years… that it’s been going on that long. When you start, it’s hard to know how things are going to turn out. We now have over 60 projects worldwide, in over 40 countries. When we started out, we thought ‘maybe we can do this’, but it’s grown actually more than we thought and the brand Laureus is pretty strong now around the world, even people in America are paying attention.
I think it’s exponential. It keeps growing and growing and I’m very excited about what we’ve been able to achieve so far, but of course there’s so that much more work to do.
Q - One reason it’s been so successful is that great sportsmen and women like yourself have been involved and want to give something back to society.
I think we athletes always try to give back to our sport, and to sport in general because our sport has given us such a great life. It’s like we almost feel guilt – and need to give something back, and most of all it’s about giving opportunities to youngsters. We had our opportunity somehow and made it happen and it’s just a shame when kids want to [do the same] but the chances are not there for them, so it’s great we can do that.
One of the reasons Laureus works is because we do have superstars as members [of the Academy] and the reasons we’re all there is for the same reason. There is no one who is bigger than Laureus; the Academy is bigger than just one member and that’s what makes it all work. So we all do what we can and are making a difference to kids around the world.
Q - Recently you did make a difference to a lot of kids in Kenya when you visited the Mathare Youth Soccer Association. What did that mean to you?
I’ve spent a lot of time in Kenya over the last few years – I spent around six months there over the last ten years. I really love the people, love the country, it’s got so much to offer. But that was my first time to a slum and, boy, it really knocks you out. To see the people dressed to the nines, going out to work but living in such squalid conditions and most of all the kids playing in the dirt and playing in the trash, just breaks your heart so you wonder what you can do apart from taking pictures. I went to the library [at MYSA] and, a small thing, they had all these National Geographic issues from the sixties until 2003 and I said ‘what happened?’ and they said ‘we couldn’t get the last four years’. So when I got back to the States, I found the last four years of National Geographic and sent them over to them. You know, it’s a small thing. I don’t care if they know who sent it to them. I enjoy reading it myself, so it’s nice the kids have the same opportunity.
Q - You’ve obviously found this a moving experience. So many children have had their lives improved by the Laureus experience.
It’s unbelievable. The numbers are astonishing, especially in the Third World countries where the dollar and the pound, or the pound and the euro go a lot further, so much further there where you can affect kids in a positive way, whereas you do these projects here – I mean we have projects everywhere, in England, in the States – but when you go to Asia or Africa that’s when you can make a difference to thousands and thousands of kids, that’s amazing. Not that they will become professional athletes, but just to have the opportunity to learn how to be healthier, to have fun, to learn skills that will work for them for the rest of their lives is very empowering and very humbling.
Martina Navratilova is a member of the Laureus World Sports Academy
This interview and footage of Laureus Academy members supporting Laureus Sport for Good Foundation projects is available for Web and TV broadcast. Contact Matt Dearden, Executive Producer, Laureus TV, on +44-(0)-20-7514-2865 or e-mail: matt.dearden@laureus.com
Material on the Laureus website is available for media use free of charge provided full credit is given, for example... "Martina Navratilova, speaking on the Laureus website"