“I just wanted to play matches,” she told me. “Every year I try to do this huge preparation for clay, and every year it goes to shit. So, I wanted to switch things up a little bit. Usually, I like to go back home because the trip to Indian Wells and Miami is quite long but this year, but instead we stuck around.”
Buoyed by practice sets with Tomljanovic, horseback riding in nearby Wellington, and a return of former coach Pam Shriver—as part of racquet sponsor Yonex’s nascent Mindset and Performance Program—a refreshed Vekic breezed through two qualifying matches over the weekend only to book a decidedly unwelcome first-round with her bestie. In their inimitable style, they celebrated the news with a down home Sunday dinner on Daniel Island.
“I’d just seen her right after my [final round qualifying] match and she was like, ‘I hope we don’t play each other,’ and I didn’t even know she was playing a qualifier. We were on the phone later about something else when she asked me if the draw’s out and neither of us knew because we try not to look at the draw. Five minutes later, she called back like, ‘Are you fucking joking?’ Her sister sent her the message we were playing each other and I was like, ‘Oh my god, out of eight people!’
“We’re always battling it out in practice, so I’m surprised it didn’t go 7-6 in the third!”
