Chapter 966 After the Show
"Thank you."
"Thank you, thank you."
While waiting for the award ceremony to be over, it was already a little past 1 a.m. local time in Melbourne, and Gawain finally left Rod Laver Arena and returned to the players' lounge.
Along the way, tournament organizers, caddies, volunteers, familiar and unfamiliar faces, all congratulated Gao Wen.
Gao Wen kept smiling as he looked into the eyes of everyone one by one, expressing his sincere gratitude. It took him nearly twenty minutes to walk a distance of just a few dozen meters. Then he finally saw the familiar warm-up exercise equipment in the lounge, and the yoga mats neatly laid out on the ground immediately caught his eye.
My knees went soft and my calves seemed to be unable to support my body anymore. I fell down and slumped on the yoga mat, wanting to fall asleep forever.
Until this moment, I can finally relax a little.
The adrenaline slowly faded, the tense nerves relaxed, the fatigue and soreness of the body slowly began to show up, and everything became more and more obvious.
The five-hour and thirty-minute fierce battle, with unexpected events and twists and turns that were like a roller coaster, was a double test of physical and mental strength.
Numbers and words are simply not enough to express one ten-thousandth of what I experienced personally. Even the audience who watched the entire game felt like they had been fished out of water.
It turns out that this is the feeling of having both body and soul hollowed out after all the power of the ancient world has been used up.
Now, Gao Wen had no way to think at all.
My mind is blank. Joy, happiness, history-making, and glory-writing are all unimportant. I put all of these aside for the moment. I just want to relax, clear my mind, and feel the release of my whole body slowly melting, just like a marshmallow melting in hot chocolate.
"ah……"
Gao Wen slumped on the yoga mat, closed his eyes, and seemed to be floating in soft clouds, and exhaled a long, long breath.
Seeing Gawain like this, Sampras, who was following behind him, couldn't help but chuckle, "This guy, only at this moment does he act like a child."
Pelt had no expression on his face. People who didn't know what was going on thought Gao Wen had lost the game. "That's not okay. A professional player shouldn't be a child."
"Now is the best time to continue training. Do you know how precious and rare such an opportunity is? Oh, yes, you are all professional players, obviously you should know."
What is the key to physical training? Break through yourself.
If you keep standing still, physical training will never be able to break through your own capacity and tap your potential; only by breaking through the ceiling again and again, constantly breaking through your own limits and breaking your own shackles, can you continue to tap your own potential and achieve a qualitative transformation.
During this year's off-season, Gao Wen's physical training was very hard and effective, and he has indeed reached a higher level.
But this is still not enough.
The point is that Gao Wen is no longer a "dark horse" but a "target", which also means that the shocks and challenges that Gao Wen will face in the future will be more arduous, and the standard of physical reserve must also be raised to a higher level.
This is the case at the Australian Open.
The most intuitive thing is to look at tonight's final.
In the first two sets, Gawain and Djokovic were both in unstable conditions, with a certain degree of fluctuation, too many mistakes and poor touch.
Pelt had no way of knowing Djokovic's specific condition; but as Gawain said, he was indeed troubled by his physical condition, and the calf cramps in the semi-finals were a sign of that.
A layman might ask, how is that possible?
Judging from the score, Djokovic and Gao Wen had a very easy journey in this year's Australian Open. They didn't lose a set until the semi-finals, and they had a clear score advantage. They were the two players with the least average time on the court. It is no exaggeration to say that they are the two players who advanced most smoothly among all male players this year.
How is it possible to face physical problems?
But competitive sports are not that simple.
The consumption caused by the intensity of the game, the pressure of the atmosphere, the mental confrontation, one's own condition, etc. are all hidden burdens, but they actually affect the fluctuations of physical fitness and state.
For Djokovic and Gawain, the off-court significance of this final far exceeded imagination.
It is precisely because of this that when they stepped onto the final stage, their physical condition was not at its best. Coupled with the hot and humid weather, their sweating increased significantly, and the loss of salt and energy intensified. The energy replenishment at the beginning of the game could not keep up with the rate of loss, so problems arose.
Gawain seemed a little "out of form", and Djokovic also had frequent problems.
From this we can see that Gao Wen still has room for improvement.
When the match was over, Peart was already thinking about the next step of Gao Wen's physical training, and don't forget that the clay court season is just around the corner.
In the same best-of-three match, on hard court, the battle is usually resolved within 90 minutes, which is a common situation; but on clay, it takes more than 120 minutes.
The length of the match, the content of the match, and the quality of the match are two completely different things.
Therefore, Pelt must think three steps ahead and absolutely cannot panic when the time comes.
But the key point is that Pelt knows how hard Gao Wen's off-season training is. After breaking the shackles and reaching a certain level, the difficulty of improving again in a short period of time will inevitably double or even triple or even quintuple.
Breakthrough, qualitative change.
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These require more diligent and extensive training.
Soon, Pelt realized that the best opportunity had already appeared.
tonight!
Tonight is the night!
It's a perfect opportunity.
A five-hour and thirty-minute battle is something that can only be encountered once in a while, let alone in training, even in a formal competition; and it was a Grand Slam final against Djokovic, so the physical and mental tests were pushed to the extreme.
This is simply a godsend.
if!
It was just a hypothesis. If they could seize the opportunity and start physical training right here and now, they could indeed quickly force Gawain to push his limits and even complete his transformation.
The inspiration in Pelt's mind surged uncontrollably.
However...Gawain is wasting such a great opportunity.
Pelt expressed deep sorrow.
Sampras' temper also rose. "Martin, you should also know that 'too much is as bad as too little'. It is indeed a good thing to seize the opportunity to break through the limit; but improper handling may leave hidden dangers of injury, or even lead to a cliff-like decline in the entire career. This is also an issue that must be taken seriously."
"Training, training, training. Even professional players shouldn't think about training all the time. Can't we just relax a little and enjoy tonight?"
"You're a professional, you should know this."
Pelt remained expressionless and retorted directly, "Of course I know that if he trained under my supervision, this problem would not have occurred."
"For professional players, training is their life. If they want to rest, they have plenty of time to lie on the ground and rest after they die."
(End of this chapter)