ROLAND GARROS

May 24, 2025

Casper Ruud

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Casper, welcome back to Paris, one of your happiest tournaments, after a strong clay court season?

CASPER RUUD: Thank you. Yeah, I feel good. It's one of the more, yeah, some of the most exciting weeks of the year for me as we're coming kind of towards the end of the European clay season.

So I hope I can finish strong here in Paris with a good result. I have had three good years here in a row, so try to make it a fourth good year in a row. That would be great.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Casper, the weather forecast is 50/50, could be heavy, could be sunny. How are you going to prepare yourself and adjust your tactics for either/or?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, I mean, the guys who take care of the courts, they are doing an incredible job. Whether it's raining or dry, I feel a little bit difference, but if you play on the big court, the court will stay quite dry all the time.

That's my feeling, because either with the roof or that they cover the court when it rains, they keep it in a good shape all the time. The ball will fly a bit slower through the air when it's cold, so you can adjust with maybe string tension, you can go down a bit when it's colder and tighten it up a bit when it's warmer.

I have been able to play good tennis here in cold and warm conditions. I honestly prefer to play in 20 degrees than 30-plus. When it gets too hot, it's kind of tough out there, but last year it was some of the coldest I have experienced here in May, June. We played that year in October once when it also got really cold, but I'm hoping that the sun will come out a little bit more, yeah. So far it's been pretty cold.

Q. I'm curious what the process was like after that crazy match with Jannik in Rome in terms of, like, you getting back on the practice court, you know, probably playing with someone who is playing a little more of a normal level than what he was putting on there. What was that like? Also, in sort of a larger picture, given that Jannik is where you would like to be, and you've come pretty close to it, are there things that you think about that you can do with your game to maybe get closer in that matchup, given that he's going to be around for a while probably?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, definitely. After Rome, I took a few days off. I went home. We had quite good weather, so I stayed a lot outside, played some golf, started practicing, and then, yeah, I didn't play someone of Jannik's level in practice for a couple of days, so it was nice to win some more points in practice.

We practiced yesterday, and he was up 4-0 in the first set, after, again, like 15 minutes. I was thinking, you know, there's something going on here. But after that, I got some games back.

But I think that you don't look at him as a clay court player because he's had great success on other surfaces, and he doesn't play that higher or heavier topspin ball, but that doesn't mean he can't play well on clay.

I think if you move well and are able to hit strong shots from defense as well on clay, it's kind of hard, because I felt when I played him, like, if I tried to open the court, he was there, and he just kind of ripped it back. If I tried to play heavier and higher, he would take it on the rise and wouldn't miss much.

Whether you're playing super heavy or not on clay, I think the most kind of frustrating thing for an opponent is if you show you can hit either heavy or strong shots all the time without too much errors. As an opponent, you get the feeling that I can't, you know, I can't outplay or I can't hit winners on this guy if you move well.

So that was a little bit, I never really had the chance to set up that many points, because it just felt like it came firing from both sides from him.

But I think that I can realize myself that I can maybe also flatten out the shots a bit more every now and then on clay and not always wait for the ball to come down, that I can maybe step in a little bit more and take more balls on the rise and go for a little bit more, because what he showed me there was that this is definitely possible, even though it's a higher bounce and slower on clay.

Q. This is kind of a tennis nerd question, but in your opinion, how much of an advantage is it for you to have the comfort level you have and movement on the clay, being able to slide into and out of your shots? Do you feel that that really makes you more efficient in terms of a mover and what you can defend and what you can attack out there?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, I think if you look at the modern game, I think almost every player now are able to slide on the right foot, the left foot, open stance, closed stance, seems like it gets better and better. To me, when I grew up watching tennis, not that many were able to do that, especially on hard court.

When I look at players like Jannik or Carlos, Novak, those who do it more often, it kind of seem like it doesn't matter whether they play on clay or hard court, because they're able to slide on both surfaces. So for me, I don't slide that much on hard court. I haven't really ever been able to feel comfortable doing that.

Sometimes you kind of have to, but to do it on both legs, open, closed stance, whatever, it's really, really impressive. It comes more natural for me on clay, and I think majority of right-handed players struggle a bit more to slide on the left leg, like it's kind of opposite. But, you know, the best players in the world, they were able to do both . If you look at Rafa on the surface, or Novak, when you thought you had them on the run on the backhand, they would open up their stance and put their feet down and slide and kind of just rip a passing.

So that's, for me, one of the tougher points to lose as a player, because you feel like you have done everything right and you have maybe come in on the right shot down to their backhand, and they come up with this shot that is ridiculously good and impressive.

If you're able to do that, you can win and you can kind of stick it to the opponent saying that, you know, ha ha, even though you thought you had me, I'm going to pass you on my, not my strongest leg open-stance winner. So I think that's something that I see most Europeans who grew up on clay are able to do more and more.

Q. You're from a similar part of the world, so I thought I'd ask if you've seen or played ever with Elmer Moller?

CASPER RUUD: I saw this compilation of this backhand of his which was crazy. That's the only thing I saw. He's a bit younger than me, but yeah.

Q. What did you think of the backhand when you watched that video?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, it looks kind of different than most other backhands, but he just plays it with so much confidence, kind of like Benoit, he would go around and rip backhand inside out. That's a shot I would never do.

I mean, it's so funny how some players hit shots, and I guess we look at each other, when I looked at that video, I was thinking, wow, I wish I had that backhand. I think I'd be a better player. But then, at the same time, when he watches me or Alcaraz or, I don't know who he likes to watch, but if he looks at a guy with a huge forehand, he probably thinks, oh, I wish I had that forehand, because then I would be complete.

We look at each other and we have to realize there are some limitations every now and then on what you feel comfortable doing. But yeah, that was really, really, really aggressive and good backhand. I want to see it live, and I hope I can play him once.

Q. How often during the course of the season would you say that you go out on court for a match without any kind of injury or pain? I don't know if you saw what Caroline Garcia posted a couple weeks ago on social but about that need to play through pain and the sort of glorification of or honor in playing despite injury and pain and whether that's a difficult thing to deal with as a professional athlete?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, it definitely is. I think tennis players are not the open ones to do it, but I think that is not -- well, tennis is obviously individual sport, and if you feel some pain, of course it comes to a limit of how much you can kind of take, but as a team-sport athlete, it's easier to sit out a few matches and let your other teammates play for you, but tennis you can't do that.

You can you always, you know, pull out or give walkover, but then you lose points, you lose prize money, you lose earnings. You lose the kind of fear of losing out on a chance. It's very big, because tennis is really about, you know, keeping your ranking all the time and doing good results.

I have definitely learned to kind of accept and live with that, that you have to push through pain. I have never experienced, like, a very bad injury for a long time, luckily. But definitely I would say more than half of my matches that I play there is something going on that you guys don't know about, whether that's just a small blister under your foot or maybe a little soreness in stomach, rib, back, knee, whatever. I think I have been through my whole body. Every part of my body has felt some kind of pain already in my career.

It's not unusual, and sometimes you get, like, really tired of it. I think that's why players have been asking a little more lately about having a little longer offseason for the body to just kind of really calm down and settle and get rid of all the inflammations here and there, because if you do well and you finish the year at the year-end Finals, you pretty much only have five to six, seven weeks before you're kind of obligated to show up in Australia again. Sometimes that's not enough.

It's really part of the job to manage, but I have, when you grow up as a kid thinking I want to be a professional player, you don't realize how much pain you'll have in your career, and it comes to a point where you just feel like you have had enough, I guess.

Q. A little more on that subject, and given what you went through here a year ago when you won the first set in that semifinal and then got so unwell, I just wonder, is that maybe one of the most disappointing moments of your career to be struck down by bad luck like that?

CASPER RUUD: Yeah, it was. It was really tough, I got some parasite from either water or something I ate or it could have come from different sources, so it's hard to track down. It was in my body for two to four weeks, so that was kind of, I guess, Day 1 where I really felt bad was that match.

It's part of this job and career, I guess, but like I said, I have been very fortunate. I have never had like a really long break or injury where I have had to come back from several-month injury. So I consider myself quite lucky and fortunate in that way.

But yeah, not ideal that it happened, and I was really fortunate, because I had a walkover in the quarters against Novak, so I had, like, four days to prepare between the fourth round and semis, so I was coming out feeling great, and then suddenly towards the end of the first set, I just, the stomach started causing issues and just felt really tired.

I'm trying not to eat any risky stuff this week and to have it happen again, but it's tough. Yeah, some other sports you kind of envy because whether you're injured, sick, you can kind of let your teammates play for you and sit out a match and come back, but in tennis it doesn't work like that. It would be nice if that could happen any other day than that last year.