Rafa was hitting all the balls as hard as he could, just like Söderling and Rosol," Isner, Querrey, and Johnson discuss practice sessions on the tour

Arthur Millot

le 18/08/2025 à 09h02

2 min to read

Isner Johnson Nadal Opelka Querrey Rosol Soderling

In the latest episode of the Nothing Major podcast, former players Querrey, Isner, and Johnson discussed the topic of practice sessions on the tour. While for some, finding a partner is a piece of cake, for others, their playing styles make it quite challenging.

S.Q.: "In Cincinnati, for instance, you often see players signing up for practice sessions by mentioning they're looking for a 'sparring partner.'"

J.I.: "Most players just talk to a friend and organize the practice, or their coaches do it. The top players even arrange it weeks in advance. It's crazy! But for others, it's harder.

Someone like Riley (Opelka), or myself for instance, not many people wanted to practice with us. So we often put 'looking for' and sometimes someone would sign up. But most of the time, people didn't want to practice with the robot (laughs). Riley hit two first serves, 74 unforced errors, and 80 winners in practice.

You had no idea what you were going to get. Riley was sometimes difficult, but he practiced the right way according to him, that's for sure. It was just a difficult practice for an hour because we never really felt like we got what we wanted."

S.Q.: "After Rafa, it was very hard too, we've talked about it before. He was hitting all the balls as hard as he could (laughs). But he wasn't the only one: Söderling and Rosol were like that too. When you got to the net, they unleashed on you. It was very intense. They wouldn't relax for the first two minutes."

Then, Querrey continued by specifying that warm-ups before matches functioned differently from regular practices:

"If you're playing on Monday at 3 PM and want to warm up at 1 PM, you just have to ask, without necessarily worrying about who it is because it's just a 30-minute warm-up. Often you don't know who you're going to hit with until the day of.

Then, there are some tournaments that only have two practice courts. You had to warm up with another player.