Rafael Nadal has focused on the 2024 Olympics, with the best possible preparation. He registered to compete in the men's singles event, but he also clearly understands that, even when competing on clay, the chance to win a gold medal is not high.
Therefore, the Spanish legend registered an additional men's doubles event, pairing with Carlos Alcaraz. It is understood that Rafa wants Alcaraz's youth to bear an important part of his ambitions.
As expected, Nadal soon said goodbye to the singles event when he lost to Novak Djokovic in round 2. It was a match that clearly showed that the 38-year-old tennis player's physical strength was affected a lot, although there were still quality shots.
In the doubles event, the "Nadalcaraz" pair started well with a victory over the No. 6 seed pair - Maximo Gonzalez and Andres Molteni. In round 2, facing the Dutch tennis player pair not in the seed group Tallon Griekspoor and Wesley Koolhof, Nadal and Alcaraz had to struggle to solve the match after a series of super tie-breakers. In round 3, "Nadalcaraz" lost in disguise to the American pair Austin Krajicek - Rajeev Ram, also the number 4 seed.
Of course, there are regrets about the failure, but Nadal's career has had 2 Olympic gold medals - 1 singles in 2008 and 1 doubles in 2016.
This summer's defeat at Roland Garros has also caused many reviews to appear with the feeling of "ending a cycle", when Nadal is 38 years old. Of course, Rafa will be thinking about his future after the 2024 Olympics, with retirement as one of the possibilities.
Or the 22-time Grand Slam winner could play a few more events until the end of this year. However, after seeing Nadal compete in doubles, this could be a possibility for the rest of his career.
There are advantages for Nadal when playing doubles that will not take physical strength like singles, matches are often not long - up to 3 sets, including Grand Slams.
In addition, on the current men's doubles rankings, in the top, there are quite a few players who are Nadal's age, such as Spanish compatriot Marcel Granollers, 38 years old, Horacio Zeballos (Argentina) 39 years old, or Ram - who just eliminated Nadal, 40 years old. Even Rohan Bopanna (India) is 44 years old.
Of course, Nadal is not a doubles player for ranking points, but he has played quite a lot of doubles. Nadal's glorious singles career sometimes makes people forget that Nadal started playing doubles in 2003 (at the US Open), played with David Sanchez and was eliminated in the first round. The following year, he and Tommy Robredo entered the semi-finals.
Nadal also played doubles at the Australian Open (2004, 20025), Wimbledon (2005) but did not have good results.
At the Olympics, before winning the 2016 gold medal with Marc Lopez, Nadal had played doubles at 2004 and 2008 events.
In addition, in the Masters 1000, Nadal has played doubles at Indian Wells, Miami, Monte-Carlo, Italian Open, Canada Open, Cincinnati, Shanghai, Paris Master, in which he won the Indian Wells twice (2010, 2012) and once the Monte-Carlo (2008).
Nadal's career doubles result is 46-30 (60%). That is the yardstick for him to think about switching to playing doubles for the rest of his career. The problem is which partner will you find suitable for the doubles match?
