For Carlos Alcaraz (20), the day is a blur.
Painful and distressed, with his forearm in discomfort, he spent the day in Murcia and boarded a train to Barcelona, ??570 kilometers contemplating the Mediterranean with Carlos, his father, and much of his team.
It takes almost six hours to get to the RCTB, in Pedralbes.
The world number three appears before the media in the middle of the afternoon.
In a message of four minutes, without questions, he expresses his condolences, his pain because of this overloaded elbow, a gibberish that had prevented him from competing in Monte Carlo, last week, and which has also invalidated him for the Trofeu Godó, where it was supposed to be released tomorrow.
Then, he moves five hundred meters to the east of the city, to the Grand Hyatt hotel, for an event by Isdin, a firm specializing in sun protection (he is the brand ambassador). At the end of the event, in a room set up for the occasion, he sat down to talk with La Vanguardia.
(At ten o’clock at night he flies back to Murcia. By the time he goes to sleep, it’s past midnight).
How does the injury occur?
It appeared on Friday, before starting Monte Carlo.
Was he going and wasn’t he going?
It was the result of a change of balls and surface. At the beginning of the training I started to notice that my arm was getting a little heavy. I didn’t pay attention to it because I had already had this feeling before, your arm gets heavy but you can continue perfectly. There was a change of balls, and on the first right that I hit I already noticed that something was happening. I tried another one, just in case it was just the time, and there I saw that no, I couldn’t. I called the physio, I stopped training, we did tests and it came out what I had.
And what is it?
I honestly don’t really know. The doctor brings it, I don’t want to attach too much importance to it. If I tell him it’s overload, maybe it isn’t.
How has it been managing since then?
I have been training almost normally, with the reverse, cut strokes, left, trying to minimize discomfort and also taking care of myself off the court to try to get to Barcelona, ??but it was not possible.
How do you handle it today?
It gives problems. I took the test, it came out perfect, everything is fine. There is a discomfort, a normal thing. We tennis players always have these discomforts, but the images are different from my sensations. I think that no matter how many tests I do, it will be a complicated injury. It will be necessary to combine the images with the sensations.
when will it happen
I don’t want to gamble by saying a date and it not being fulfilled. Hopefully he will make it to the Mutua Madrid Open (starts April 22).
I read that he cried when he had to resign in Barcelona.
Yes. It was a very hard blow. I really wanted to come. My group of friends had already made reservations to come and see me play. Think that, except for Barcelona and Madrid, they never see me. I wait a whole year to be here. I don’t usually cry about these things, but Sunday was really hard.
Last year it was number one. This year, playing very well, he is number three. It’s strange, tennis!
It is… You play good tennis, but maybe not enough to repeat last year’s ranking. You defend points, you play against yourself, you need the same results as last year, and you also have to beat your opponents. It’s complex, no doubt.
Sinner appeared before you. It was top 20 before you. Then you swept him away. And now it’s back at the front. Will their races be like this?
Hopefully we’ll have this battle, him one and me two, and then vice versa. This will make me better.
What do you practice to dislodge it? Does it give us ideas?
I keep them to myself, but he is a very complete player. They all have weaknesses, Djokovic too, even if it looks like they don’t. The difficult thing is to find them, because they are very small.
Is Djokovic more vulnerable?
It never is. Now he does not have exceptional results, although they are very good, with Grand Slam or Monte Carlo semi-finals. The thing is, we’re used to seeing him win everything.
At the end of last year, Ferrero (his coach) stretched his ears. He said that if you have to train, you have to train.
Well, that last part of the season took a toll on me. After the American tour I needed to maintain the illusion. Ferrero came to tell me that the season doesn’t end in September. For things like this I have him by my side: he doesn’t laugh at my thanks, but tells me what he has to say.
Has he spoken to Nadal to be a partner at the Games?
I haven’t spoken to them. But I hear he wants to do double with me, and he knows I want to do it with him too.
Would you place yourself on the right and him on the left?
I do not know. I say: ‘Rafa, where are you going?’ And I adapt.
