Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal: Two Parallel Paths to Greatness

By
at Internationaled.org

Published: April 6, 2010

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With thanks to Tim Ruffin for permission to explore a different view of Rafael Nadal’s and Roger Federer’s "Paths to Greatness."

I’m in the opposite camp from Tim when it comes to allegiances. Roger is my man, Rafa is his.

It’s a question of taste, of subjectives, and perhaps of some resonance with one’s own character and qualities.

But our camps probably overlap like a Venn diagram when objectivity takes control.

Rather than being separated by personal likes, we can shake hands over the common ground of respect, admiration, appreciation, or just the plain enjoyment of seeing something we love being done to the very highest standard.

The tennis of Federer and Nadal looks, tastes, and sounds very different. From the style of their games, to the on-court personas of the men, the physical tools of their success could not be more different.

Rafa exudes passion, energy, intensity, and utter commitment in every pump, jump and gesture. Roger exudes a stillness, a calmness, an easy control of emotions: serious and contained almost to the point of self absorption.

One is an explosion of fearsome emotion, the other a still millpond, deep but deadly.

Where Rafa explodes with color and emotion like a Van Gogh painting, Roger is a complex interweaving of subtle tints like a Cezanne. Yet the canvases of their games are both the result of the same palette of colors, the same brushes, the same obsession.

Start with the raw material: family, roots, upbringing.

They are summer sons—one June, one August. They each have one sister. They both grew up, and are still part of, a close and supportive family unit.

In their early years, either could as easily have chosen soccer as tennis. Neither did, and ever since they have committed themselves unswervingly to their sport.

They trained in their home countries. The German-speaking Federer ...
Article Source: Bleacher Report - Tennis

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