Fritz and His Forgotten Passport: The Crazy Story Told by Isner

When Taylor Fritz realized he had forgotten his passport in Los Angeles while scheduled to play in Chengdu, all seemed lost. But the American refused to give up and embarked on a wild race across the globe.

In the latest episode of the Nothing Major podcast, John Isner shared an anecdote from the Asian tour about Taylor Fritz, who had experienced quite a misadventure in 2019 due to a forgotten passport:

“We were all in Geneva after the Laver Cup to make the same trip: Geneva-Beijing-Chengdu. It was a Monday, so the Chengdu tournament had already started. At check-in at the airport, he noticed he had forgotten his passport with his Chinese visa.

He was in Los Angeles and had a match to play in 36 hours. I was next to him, laughing a bit, and I told him: 'Tough luck. Go back home, enjoy Los Angeles, and we’ll see each other in Tokyo or wherever you play next.' He replied: 'No, I’m going to play Chengdu.'

So he left Geneva and immediately booked a flight to Paris. He arrived in Paris and then took a flight to Los Angeles. An Uber drove him home, he asked the driver to wait, grabbed his passport, and headed back to the airport. He then took a flight from Los Angeles to Tokyo to Chengdu.

In Chengdu, I ran into him at breakfast. He ate, left, and four hours later he played his match against Bublik. He lost 7-5 in the third set. I thought he was completely crazy, because who else would do that? There’s only one person in the world who would go to such lengths just to keep playing, and that’s Taylor Fritz.”