This year’s WTA Finals has been surrounded by controversy over its scheduling and conditions of the court but Iga Swiatek says the circumstances have proven to be a blessing in disguise for her.
The Pole stormed to the title on Sunday with a one-sided 6-1, 6-0, win over Jessica Pegula in less than an hour. Making it the most one-sided final to ever take place at the end-of-year championships. Swiatek dropped just 20 games throughout the entire tournament which is the fewest conceded by a player en route to winning the WTA Finals since the round-robin format was reintroduced in 2003.
“I’m just really happy and super proud of myself,” Swiatek said. “This week has been not easy, but I feel like it’s a kind of a reflection of the whole season. So I’m just happy that I could cope with everything well, and I kind of used my experience from all these years to perform well here.”
As a result of her triumph, Swiatek has returned to world No.1 for the first time since September. It is the second season in a row she has ended the year at the top of the standings. She held the top position for 75 weeks before getting overtaken by Aryna Sabalenka earlier this year.
Coming into the WTA Finals, the 22-year-old was fully aware of what she was required to do to reclaim her No.1 position. However, she was able to deal with the pressure by focusing on the challenging conditions in Cancun which has prompted criticism from those participating at the event. The stadium wasn’t ready until the same weekend the tournament began which gave players little time to practice on the court. There were also complaints about bad ball bounces and then poor weather delayed the final by 24 hours.
“The conditions that were kind of tricky also helped me to just, you know, focus on adjust my footwork, my shots … that kept me busy from thinking about all of that,” Swiatek said.
“So I think today was … just being narrow with your head, only thinking about the right stuff.”
Swiatek admits that thinking about the race to No.1 has affected her performance at previous tournaments, such as the US Open where she was beaten in the fourth round by Jelena Ostapenko.
“It played [in my mind] a lot in the US Open and the tournaments before but I kind of learned my lesson,” she said.
“This time I didn’t want it to have an impact on me … it’s hard not to think about stuff like that but actually when I went on court I knew that I had to focus on different things.”
Swiatek ends her season with a total of 68 Tour-level wins which is the highest tally achieved by a WTA player since Serena Williams won 79 in 2013. Out of those victories, 13 of them were against top 10 opposition. Besides the WTA Finals, she also won titles at Roland Garros (French Open), Stuttgart, Warsaw and Beijing.
“The team that’s been with me the whole season, we had many ups and downs,” she reflected.
“This is for sure an up. We will for sure have many more if we keep working like that.”
