Iga Swiatek settles into world No. 1 role: 'I just want to play good tennis'
The Polish superstar will go after a third Roland-Garros title next month, but she's blocking out the noise a year after her historic 37-match winning streak.
Tennis
A year ago, Polish tennis star Iga Swiatek was amidst an out-of-this-world 37-match win-streak that changed the landscape of women’s tennis after the sudden retirement of then-top-ranked Ashleigh Barty.
Twelve months on – and having come back to Earth – the 21-year-old finds herself firmly planted in one place: As the No. 1 player in the world.
“I'm just pretty proud of my consistency,” Swiatek told reporters recently after capturing her 13th career title, in Stuttgart, Germany. “When I was consistent on another level [last year], it was nice. But this level kind... [it’s more of an] even expectation.”
Swiatek, now a three-time major champion, slides into tennis’ clay season with two Roland-Garros titles to her name: Her breakout Grand Slam victory in 2020, as well as last year.
Her 2022 win helped her reach 35 wins in a row, as she eventually matched Martina Hingis’ 37-match streak from 1997.
While 2022 was - in many ways - a fairytale for the admitted avid reader Swiatek, she’s written herself into the story of the WTA Tour, as she puts it, as an “even” leader, with the likes of Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka, Wimbledon winner Elena Rybakina and a host of other top stars chase her.
She’s settled into the Iga Era.
But how will it play out is yet to be seen.
“I feel like I just can use my experience a little bit more, more than worry about” pressure and expectations, she said in Stuttgart.
“I'm just happy that I'm World No. 1 for more than a year,” she added with a smile. “It's an exciting time.”
Iga Swiatek: The “sky is the limit”
Swiatek, from the outside, seamlessly took the baton from Barty, who had won the Australian Open in 2022 when she shockingly retired at the top of the sport at age 25. The Pole captured six titles across four months in that 37-match streak, which was halted in the middle rounds of Wimbledon after her French Open triumph.
“She just gets on with it,” tennis great Martina Navratilova said of Swiatek’s mentality after her Parisian triumph. “She really is great about staying in the moment and not panicking. She has confidence as well.”
But the American hardcourt swing brought challenges to that confidence, and it wasn’t until she worked her way through four particularly sticky tests in the New York City summer humidity that she could feel the same air of invincibility that the streak had given her, besting Ons Jabeur in a roller-coaster women’s final.
“It's hard to describe it in one sentence,” Swiatek said after the win. “But I'm just super proud of myself. I wasn't sure if I was on the level yet to win actually a Grand Slam, especially [at the] U.S. Open where the surface is so fast.”
She added: “It's something that I wasn't expecting for sure. It's also like a confirmation for me that [the] sky is the limit. I'm proud... also surprised little bit; just happy that I was able to do this.”
While she found both success and failure in the latter stages of the 2022 season, Swiatek had become a household name for Polish fans – and for tennis fans around the world. She was named the WTA Player of the Year and European Sportsperson of the Year.
To start 2023, she was named the Polish Sports Personality of the Year – and recently added to TIME’s 100 list of most influential list.
"I just want to play good tennis"
But what comes next for Iga? Clay remains her most dominant surface, and currently she’s being challenged at the high-altitude Madrid Open, which can make the terre battue especially tricky – for everyone.
“I want to win every tournament that I go to,” she said upon arriving in the Spanish capital. “But, you know, Madrid is still this kind of tournament that I haven't figured out 100 percent. ... For now, I'm just really focussed on the first [match] and I'm going to do it step by step.”
When you reach the top of the ladder that can be the challenge: Still taking things one step at a time.
Swiatek is understanding that more and more, as the women’s tour is now without Barty, as well as four-time major champion Naomi Osaka, who announced a pregnancy earlier this year. The GOAT, Serena Williams, said she was “evolving away” from the sport at the back-end of 2022.
Yet as the noise grows louder around her, Swiatek has grown accustomed to popping on her noise-cancelling headphones as she walks on court. ... and walks off of it, too.
“I just want to play good tennis,” she added in Stuttgart, where she beat Sabalenka in the final. “I don't want to think about all that stuff that is usually bothering us.
A recipe for success?
“I was able to do that here,” she said. “I really like playing on clay, so I just hope I'm gonna focus on just tennis, you know, just playing.”
Just playing.