The U.S. Open tennis tournament came to a close Monday night when a very tall Argentine with many, many names beat the heavily favored Roger Federer in a marathon five-set match. Juan Martin del Potro, whose known nicknames include Enano, Palito and Delpo, became the first person to defeat Federer at the U.S. Open in six years. When he won the final point, the 20-year-old del Potro fell onto his back, spread his long arms and wept. If you’ve ever wondered what one of those giant Ents from The Lord of the Rings might look like stretched out on a tennis court, young Delpo offered a reasonable facsimile.
Del Potro is 6’6” and has a forehand like a wrecking ball. His body seems built for the express purpose of smashing small objects with a tennis racket. But, as a dream machine of tennis haymaking, Delpo’s body is not quite as impressive as the compact frame of Kim Clijsters. Somehow, Clijsters was able to fight her way through this year’s tournament and win the women’s championship despite taking a break from professional tennis for 27 months and, oh yeah, having a baby. Before she even made it to the final, Clijsters had to play Serena Williams in a match now famous because the not-very-serene Serena lost her shit at one of the line judges near the end. Clijsters, who outplayed Williams and deserved to win, gave her opponent a sympathetic, motherly pat when the match was over. Then the 26-year-old Clijsters went on to dominate her finals opponent and win the trophy, a silver tureen nearly as big as Clijsters’ daughter Jada.
Clijsters is from Belgium. Is there something special in Belgian culture that might help a woman return to form and come back an even better tennis player than she was before taking time off and having a baby? Does the combination of excellent chocolate and fruity beer somehow prepare one to undergo the amazing transformation of pregnancy and childbirth, then win a Grand Slam tournament? Is all this somehow tied to those European healthcare models we keep hearing about?
Furthermore, I wonder: is my own fascination with the Clijsters story an indication that I have weird American preconceptions about what motherhood is supposed to be, about what female bodies are supposed to do?
Clijsters told reporters that being a mom made her better on the court. “For me, it’s something that’s really made me a lot more aware of who I am and of my body,” she said. “And I think it helps me a lot when I’m out there on the court because I can notice little changes, whether it’s my level or my attitude, a lot quicker, and that definitely helps.”
The phrase “more aware of who I am and of my body” is telling. It suggests that athletes need a sense of self—real emotional intelligence—in order to be at their very best. It also suggests that having a sense of the body’s limits can be crucial to athletic success. This is a subversive notion in our sports-and-fitness-obsessed culture. We’re constantly confronted with Gatorade and Nike commercials that preach bullshit notions along the lines of “No Limits! No Excuses! Do the Impossible!” Tennis, more than most sports I think, exposes the way that sustained physical exertion can tax the body. There are no substitutes in tennis. No teammates (at least in singles). In tennis, you’re playing against your opponent, but you’re also playing against the creeping inevitability of exhaustion. If you can pace yourself in the right way, you may be able to overcome a more talented but less experienced opponent.
Juan Martin del Potro’s championship run was no small feat—no small anything, given his height and his bludgeoning ground strokes. But Clijsters had the more inspiring story at this year’s U.S. Open. While Del Potro was playing out a tried-and-true script (young upstart outlasts veteran winner, pointing the way to future greatness), Clijsters came up with a script that feels a lot more unusual: woman explores the boundaries of female physiology, gives birth, then dares to wonder if motherhood might raise her game.
