THE CHAMPIONSHIPS

July 1, 2025

Ben Shelton

Press Conference

B. SHELTON/A. Bolt

6-4, 7-6, 7-6

THE MODERATOR: Questions, please.

Q. You had a semifinal appearance at the Australian Open, and you had a great four-set match against Alcaraz where you had your chances as well at Roland Garros. Do you feel like you peak at these slams? Of course, you had a third-set victory today, and you seem to play well at these majors.

BEN SHELTON: Yeah, 100%. I play best at the majors. Probably part atmosphere. I love playing on the big stages. I love playing the big matches. I love competing in front of big crowds. It's just everything about it is special for me. It makes it the most fun.

I love the long format. I think it helps me find my best tennis. I find myself playing better and better as the sets and matches go on. Yeah, I think all those things accumulate to me having my best results at slams.

Q. I kind of would like to ask a random question about Florida sports. Obviously a long time ago Joakim Noah was a big hero on campus, and he's the son of Yannick. Do you know him? Do you know Yannick? Is there a connection there?

BEN SHELTON: Yeah, I've met both of them. I wouldn't say like a huge connection or we know each other well. I kind of met Yannick more this year after he became the Laver Cup captain. I think I met him at the French Open, but I met Joakim at a few football games back in the day. Huge legend. Looked up to that guy, for sure, when I was a kid.

Yeah, what he's done as a professional athlete, his father being a great tennis player, and doing it as a Florida Gator is really impressive. You know, it's not talked about that much. He's one of the -- not like first, but early non-American guys to be really successful in the NBA. So, yeah, definitely looked up to those guys, and cool to be able to meet them.

Q. Did you get a nice or special vibe from Yannick? It sounds like a brief meeting, but did it feel good and he's such a special guy?

BEN SHELTON: Yeah, definitely a special guy. I think he's happy-go-lucky. He always has got a smile on his face. He's an entertainer and enjoys life, tennis, sports in general.

So I think that we'll get along really well and have a friendly rivalry at the Laver Cup, hopefully for years to come. Yeah, I hope to get some more time to pick his brain.

Q. I was speaking to Reilly and Taylor a bit about serve bot, the idea of that. It feels like you --

BEN SHELTON: You think I'm a bot?

Q. No, no. That's what I was going to -- it feels like you maybe made a conscious decision to move away. You've got so much to your game. Do you think serve bot is an insult to players? Where would you want to be on that kind of --

BEN SHELTON: So you think I was a bot, and then I decided to stop being a bot?

Q. No, I don't think you were ever a serve bot.

BEN SHELTON: But you said I made a conscious decision to move out of that. Eh?

Q. Maybe a conscious decision to be like, I do not want to rely on it, I don't want to go for just power necessarily.

BEN SHELTON: No, I'm giving you a hard time. You're 100% right. I used to be a bot for sure, and I relied on my serve a lot. I think there are so many great returners, guys who can neutralize pretty much any serve. You have to be able to back it up.

For me, developing different parts of my game, breaking serve, higher percentage, being better defending, deeper in rallies. Obviously having a great serve and getting free points is huge on a surface like this, but year-round I think it's important to have a multi-facetted game.

I think it's really important for me. So I don't think it's an insult at all. There's 100% matches that I play that I'm a complete bot, but I don't think that I'm a bot all the time.

Q. Do you think there's a ceiling for a serve bot?

BEN SHELTON: What do you mean?

Q. That there's only so far you can get with it. Maybe that's 20 in the world or 15 in the world, but to go higher...

BEN SHELTON: It just depends on how good the serve is. You know, John was top 10. He'll say 1,000% he was a bot. I don't know. I think it's different for everybody.

But, yeah, I don't think that I'm a serve bot. I try not to put any limitations on myself or what I can do in other parts of the game. Yeah, I don't know, maybe. It's a question for the media.

Q. How do you keep your sort of chin up after a couple of weeks of results that you probably would have preferred to have been a little better in tournaments, and then coming back here and sort of walking on to this grass, what do you tell yourself to sort of wipe the slate clean?

BEN SHELTON: It's three years in a row. I played like crap in Queen's. I played like crap in Mallorca. I come here. I feel good. The grass feels amazing. I'm moving well, and I play well at Wimbledon. For me not a big deal.

It happened in 2023. It happened in 2024. It happened in 2025. Those are tournaments that I've taken early losses. It's not new to me. Like I was saying before, this is the tournament that I want to peak well for and play really well.

This is actually the year that I've gotten the most grass court matches under my belt. I played five before Wimby, which is huge for me, even though three of those were losses. Just to get the experience and feel and moving, playing, and figure some things out. Yeah, once I got here with those matches under my belt, I feel pretty confident.

Q. You're a top-10 player now. Is there a different kind of feeling you have being a top-10 player? What do you think your ceiling is?

BEN SHELTON: It's crazy. I feel the exact same. No different. I get up in the morning. I'm still lazy. It's tough to get out of bed. My skin feels the same.

It's a cool milestone for sure in tennis, 1,000%, but for me I've never been a rankings guy. I have never really looked too hard at the rankings. I want to be winning tournaments. That's my goal. I want to be a complete all-around player.

Hitting that milestone, I'm sure that once I'm home and I have a little bit more time to kind of reflect, I'll think about a little bit more how cool it is, but you know, we're in the middle of the season. I have a lot of things that I'm trying to accomplish this year. I have a lot of things that need to improve in my game, and that's where my full focus is right now.

Q. Just on today, this is your first three-set win at Wimbledon. Last year was a lot of five-setters. How did that feel to get it done in three sets?

BEN SHELTON: It feels great. For longevity in the tournament and feeling well down the stretch, getting some quicker wins is important. Five-set matches, they catch up to you. It's tough to recover. The body doesn't do too well after those.

For me it's huge confident-wise as well. I've lost some tiebreakers in the last few weeks. Actually like six of them in a row. So to get two today and feel like I'm back playing the big points well, serving well in the big points, and right where I want to be, it gives me a lot of confidence that I can keep it going in this tournament.

Q. In those two tiebreakers what do you feel like you did to mentally get over the line? Did you approach the tiebreakers differently? How do you go about those moments where it can be so tight in the sport? Do you think it's important to start out early so you don't fall behind a big lead? Do you tell yourself anything differently to do mentally?

BEN SHELTON: You've just got to be chill. On the other guy's serve, you want to make him play as many balls as possible. I had a lot of confidence because late in those two sets I was putting a lot of pressure on his serve. I was putting a lot of returns in play. I was going deep. I had break points. I had chances. They were there. I could have broken at the end of those sets. So going into the tiebreaker, I know I'm going to get my looks.

When I'm returning well like that, it takes a lot of pressure off of my serve. If I lose one point or go down a mini-break, no big deal. If I'm in a position where I'm not putting a return in the court and I'm not putting any pressure on the guy's serve, then I feel more pressure to make it happen on my serve. That's kind of where I got into trouble a little bit the last few weeks.

So when I'm in the state I was in today, even going down a mini-break in the second tiebreaker, it's like I've been here a million times. I'm putting every return in the court, so it's inevitable that I'm going to get it back.

Q. You beat an Aussie today. You've got another one in the second round. Can you stay away from our guys already? What do you make of Rinky Hijikata?

BEN SHELTON: Yeah, great player. Very decisive win today. I'm guessing he played well. I didn't watch any of it, but to win 3-1-1 is a good effort.

It'll be a tough match. We've played a few times, challengers. Kind of came up through at the same time. Obviously a college tennis guy. I like him a lot, and great grass court player. It should be tough.

All the Aussies are tough on grass. Seems to be one of their favorite surfaces, a surface they always play well on. Yeah, I'm looking forward to the battle, for sure.

Q. In terms of the top-10 thing, have you always been good at just always looking forward? Obviously in this sport there's a new tournament every week and new goals. Has that been a quality that you've always had, or is it something you've had to adjust to since you came on tour?

BEN SHELTON: Yeah, it's a balance. You want to always be able to look forward and look to the next thing and have your goals in mind, but at the same time when you are in those big moments or you're in a tournament like this, you don't want to be looking forward to what's next week or when am I going back to the U.S. or, you know, looking forward to the next slam, the US Open. It's like we're here at Wimbledon. I'm focusing on Wimbledon, and that's all that's in my brain.

So you have to be able to kind of go back and forth and, yes, have a long-term mindset and be process-oriented and focus on improving and knowing what you want to be and accomplish in the future.

But at the same time, seeing the opportunity in front of you for what it is. We're at Wimbledon. It's a great opportunity, another Grand Slam, one of my favorite tournaments. Yeah, that's kind of what I'm focused on. So you've got to go back and forth.