“I didn't like the center of attention, I hide from people” + valuable advice received from Steffi Graf

A little more than a year after his retirement from tennis, announced spontaneously in Cluj-Napoca, after the lost match in the 1st round of the Transylvania Open, Simona Halep he looks at his career with clear eyes, with emotion, honesty, but also with a lot of objectivity.

This was revealed in a discussion of almost an hour with Horia Tecauin the MindArchitect podcast – the inaugural edition – calmly and openly addressing stages, moments, aspects of a relationship with tennis that began in childhood and that led to a level of results and celebrity unique in Romania.

The two-time Grand Slam champion said the hardest part was keeping her composure on court. “It broke me, I couldn't control my emotions and impulsiveness. But somehow, working as a psychologist for many years made me accept myself. I mean to understand that this is who I am and that this can help me“, she elaborated.

“Even if sometimes it's against me, many times it helps me to have the fire I needed to win some matches”, he added, then also mentioning that “we were talking a lot”.

At the same time, those nerve discharges also had a beneficial role. They were releasing her and mobilizing her for the next point, game, set.

24of WTA titles won by Simona Halep in her career, competing in 18 other finals

“That helped me a lot because I didn't give up. Even though it looked like it from the outside, many times I saw a lot of criticism that I didn't care about the match and so on, no, it was just what I was transmitting. I was 100% for every point. I wasn't always mentally prepared, after a phase where I was talking and getting angry.

All this stuff was damaging me to the next point. But I was fighting and I was 100%, how can I say, very prepared physically and mentally, somehow, mentally to play the next point”, explained Simona.

Simona Halep: “It wasn't easy for me, I felt all the attention”

Asked by Horia if she had moments when she felt she didn't like tennis, she answered promptly, without hesitation.

“No, I didn't have a single moment about tennis and I never said, until late, that I wanted to quit tennis, that I couldn't handle it anymore. What I didn't like… I didn't like traveling and it was kind of hard for me because that was the main point. I had to go somewhere else every week, on planes, with all kinds of changes.

But in tennis, no. I liked it. I really liked everything. Everything about tennisHalep said.

What does he feel was the price paid for the whole sporting experience? “Popularity”, again an answer without hesitation.Because I am, I was, I'm much better now, but I was a very introverted person. I didn't like the spotlight at all, not at all“, assured Simona, then continuing with a funny revelation.

“I remember when my dad used to tell me that when I was seven, eight years old, when I was going to the National Tennis Center and playing tournaments, you know the back parking lot? I'd go there to warm up so no one would see me. So I was hiding from people“, she said, laughing now, after all this time.

“And it was not easy for me in 2013-2014, after the first Grand Slam final, where I felt that all the attention and all the desire of people to talk to me, to take a picture, an autograph overwhelmed me during that period,” she added.

I didn't know how to handle the criticism from the press and I suffered a lot. It was hard for me on this side. And I think it was the most expensive price. Privacy, you don't have privacy anymore when you become so public – Simona Halep

Simona Halep and the pressure: “I've always liked it”

Then addressing the subject of pressure, he emphatically stated that “i always liked it.” Then he developed.

“I was actually talking to Darren a lot of times that I had to use the pressure to my advantage and I learned that and started to like it. Somehow I turned a burden into pleasure. And I said, I repeated to myself, I kept repeating to myself that pressure is good and it keeps you more focused and you are much more attentive to what you have to do and somehow I drew it in my favor”, detailed Simona Halep.

Simona Halep during the 2019 Wimbledon final

“And it's been more manageable. I've talked to a lot of people, I've had nice people around me and they've helped me with all kinds of advice, but you don't know what it's like. You are not born with such things. Who would have imagined that I, from Constanța, would become perhaps the most famous person in sports in Romania? So it was not easy to manage“, she emphasized.

How did she manage the outside pressure, the wishes of everyone, of the fans, for her to triumph?

“It didn't add to me tennis-wise in the sense that my preparation was the same. I wasn't overwhelmed, not wanting to go to practice anymore or saying it's too hard, I don't want this thing anymore. It was hard for me emotionally, I had very strong emotions before matches.

Maybe it was people's expectations and somehow it was turning into my thrash from the beginning of the matches. I don't know exactly how much the outside pressure affected me. I think I had good people, my team was always right and they kind of helped give me the confidence that I could,” she said.

Simona Halep and advice from Steffi Graf

An interesting episode cleared up some of his fears, thanks to the advice given by a great tennis champion, winner of 22 Grand Slam singles tournaments.

Steffi Graf and Simona Halep. Photo: Cristi Preda (GSP)

“I remember a moment, at Indian Wells in 2016. In 2015 I won the tournament and went to Vegas. My name was Darren and I met Steffi Graf and Andre Agassi,” Simona said.

“Darren tells them that Simona is very stressed because she has to defend the title. Steffi came to me and told me that «you only have to think that you were able to win it once and you will definitely be able to win it again. If you don't win it, life goes on».

Somehow I freed myself and said I don't have to play to defend my points, I have to play to be really good every week. That's why I always said in the press that every tournament, every week for me was total. I have never prepared two months before for a Grand Slam. I mean to go to Rome and Madrid to prepare for Roland Garros. Never. I always took every tournament 100%“, she concluded.