Federer’s five consecutive US Open championships are considered the most difficult feat to achieve in tennis. Photo: US Open

Federer replaced Andy Roddick as number one in the ATP after winning his first Australian Open title in January 2004. No one took this position of “Express Train” until August 2008.

During those five seasons, Federer won 10 Grand Slams. 2006 is considered the most successful season of Federer’s career, with 12 singles titles, including three Grand Slams in Australia, Wimbledon and the US. He also won the ATP Finals, then also known as the Masters Cup and the final match took place in a five-set, three-win format.

Rafael Nadal ended Federer’s dominance of the ATP scoreboard after winning the 2008 Olympic gold medal in Beijing. Before Nadal, no one could come close to Federer’s position for 287 consecutive weeks. This is an almost unbreakable record, as the second person, the legendary Jimmy Connors, only had 160 consecutive weeks. Djokovic, who broke Federer’s record for total number of weeks as number one, had 122 consecutive weeks of doing so, ending in 2016.

Since Federer in 2008, no one has successfully defended the US Open. The year-end hard court Grand Slam is a nightmare for every champion. This year Daniil Medvedev was eliminated in the fourth round, becoming the 14th consecutive champion to fail to retain the cup. Federer is the only person in the Open Era to win the US Open five consecutive times.

According to legend John McEnroe, the US Open, which takes place at the end of the year, when many players are tired after a long season, is the most difficult Grand Slam event to dominate. The hard court surface of the US Open is also familiar to all players, making the surface advantage less. Even clay-court specialist Nadal has had success in New York, and this year’s champion Carlos Alcaraz, as well as runner-up Casper Ruud, are known for their clay-court prowess.

Federer won the US Open for the first time in 2004 at the age of 23, defeating senior Andre Agassi after five sets in the quarterfinals, then defeating Tim Henman and defeating Lleyton Hewitt, who was then a tennis prodigy. Before Alcaraz became world number one last week, Hewitt was the youngest world number one since the scoreboard was introduced in 1973. But, Hewitt had no chance against Federer, losing two sets 0-6 in the final match. conclude.

After Hewitt, Federer’s defeats in the US Open finals three years later were Agassi, Roddick and Novak Djokovic. In 2008, after losing the world number one ranking, Federer still successfully defended the championship in New York by defeating Djokovic in the semi-finals, then defeating Andy Murray in the final. Federer’s period of US Open dominance only ended when he unexpectedly lost to Juan Martin del Potro in the 2009 final.

“That’s probably the match I want to play again the most,” Federer said in 2017 when recalling the defeat at the hands of his junior Argentina, who also announced his retirement in 2022. “I feel like I should have won the championship, could have gone 2-0 or ended it 3-1”. Del Potro, then 20 years old, played fearlessly and was a rare case in history of defeating Federer in both tie-break series in one match, 7-5 in set two and 7-4 in set four, respectively.

In the Open Era, only two legends, Ivan Lendl and John McEnroe, won consecutive US Open titles.

Federer dominates the Wimbledon grass court and also holds the record of winning the ATP Finals six times. Photo: Wimbledon

Federer also holds the record of winning Wimbledon eight times, including five consecutive times. Djokovic can catch up with this record if he continues to be crowned in 2023.

At his peak, Federer was surprisingly stable. He entered 10 consecutive Grand Slam finals, between Wimbledon 2005 and US Open 2007. From Wimbledon 2004 to Australian Open 2010, Federer had 23 consecutive Grand Slam semi-finals and won 20 of them.

Federer also reached 36 consecutive Grand Slam quarterfinals, before shockingly losing to Sergiy Stakhovsky in the second round of Wimbledon 2013. Tennis history has never seen a better statistical series than that.

From the 2003 Vienna Open to the 2005 Masters Cup, Federer won 24 consecutive finals, defeating top opponents at that time: Agassi, Hewitt, Roddick, Marat Safin and rising young talent Nadal.

Federer did not even lose once in three years, from 2004 to 2006. He went through 194 matches with at least one set win each match. In this series of matches, Federer lost only 10 times, including five times at the hands of Nadal. Carlos Alcaraz currently has 64 consecutive matches without losing, still far from Federer’s record. The person who ended Federer’s achievement was Murray, in the second round of the 2006 Cincinnati Masters.

“If you look at Federer’s opponents at that time, everyone had a Grand Slam and their own unique weapon,” former world number one Mats Wilander said about the most brilliant period of Federer’s career, 2004 to 2008. . “Federer also faced very strong competition from young talents, the earliest being Nadal, then Djokovic and Murray. That era demonstrated extraordinary talent, and the ability to maintain physical and mental health at a very stable level. of Federer”.