With just a month and a half left in the season, Jasmine Paolini is part of that group of players who can walk peacefully and confidently through these final tournaments. The Italian, who started the year as #30 in the rankings and not knowing what it was like to win two Grand Slam matches in a row, now stands as one of the best in 2024, holding a privileged spot within the top 5 in the world. It changed her life, speaking with total honesty. However, the season still holds some incentives to prolong a form that she doesn’t want to let go of for anything in the world.
“We are trying to stay focused, to live in the present moment. It’s difficult because we are at the end of the season; right now, I’ve accumulated many matches, but at the same time, it’s positive that I’ve played so many matches at this stage. The current plan is to continue training well, keep the motivation at its peak, and achieve a big goal: to qualify for the WTA Finals. With all this, all we have left is to step on the accelerator,” affirms the 28-year-old tennis player, who as of today still doesn’t have that ticket to Riyadh assured.
With close to 5,000 points in the Race, only three names appear above Jasmine in terms of performance this season: Swiatek, Sabalenka, and Rybakina, with the first two already mathematically qualified. “I’ve had a very good season, so it would be great to be part of the WTA Finals for the first time in my career. For me, it’s a dream; we’re talking about a truly exclusive club, so I’m looking forward to being there to compete. Undoubtedly, it will be a very exciting and fun experience,” she appreciates with enthusiasm in statements collected by the very WTA.
A FINAL PUSH
Looking at Paolini’s record, we find a total of 54 individual matches played, to which we would have to add another 42 in doubles. You can imagine how overwhelmed the body gets when you haven’t stopped competing over these nine months. “The schedule is very tight; we don’t even have many weeks to prepare for the preseason, which gets shorter every year,” says the Italian threading finely. “We are getting used to not having too many weeks to train, and this is something that must be managed very well. We are now at the end of the season; I played many matches in the last months, but I’m trying not to think if I’m very tired or not. All we have to do is to keep moving forward.”
Champion in Dubai, finalist at Roland Garros, Wimbledon finalist, or gold medalist in Paris. These are just some of the achievements Paolini signed in 2024, the best season of her life. Now that we are in the final stretch, with one last goal about to be tackled, her mind demands that she always step with her feet on the ground. Accepting that she has become a reference, but knowing that at any moment, she could make a mistake on the court.
“I’m trying to be realistic, thinking that any day I could crash on the court, I don’t know if it’s today or tomorrow, but it would be something logical that could happen. If you want to be consistent, you have to minimize the ups and downs, especially the downs; I would say that this is the most important and also what I improved the most this season. Ups and downs eventually come if you are always there; the secret lies in knowing how to deal with them so as not to go down too much,” she agrees.
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