Iga Swiatek explains what has been ‘strange’ about her tennis recently

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Iga Swiatek has delivered several surprise results, good and bad, recently.

The former world number one, best known for her clay-court dominance, didn’t win a title on the surface last year.

Instead, Swiatek won Wimbledon, the Cincinnati Open, and the Korea Open, on grass and hard courts.

Speaking to the media ahead of Indian Wells, Swiatek shared her thoughts on what’s happened lately.

Iga Swiatek shares her theory on ‘strange’ title wins in Wimbledon and Cincinnati

During her pre-tournament press conference, Swiatek said the following.

“Yeah, it’s kind of strange, because who would have expected that actually this was going to be the case?” she said.

“I think, you know, I felt really, like, fresh in these places, Wimbledon and in Cincinnati, like without anything in the back of my mind that I should do.

“So that also helped me to sometimes maybe perform even better, but honestly, I think also it’s a bit of a coincidence, maybe not Wimbledon, because I actually feel like I changed my approach on Wimbledon and before Wimbledon to practice a little bit differently, to use different skills on grass.

“But yeah, the Cincinnati tournament, I hadn’t played well there, but this year [last year], the conditions changed a little bit with the surface, it fit me a little bit better, and I immediately kind of used that to my advantage.”

The Pole then touched on the United Cup, another tournament she recently won for the first time.

“United Cup, kind of funny, because I was always winning most of my singles, and we couldn’t do it, and this year actually my singles performance dropped a bit, but actually, we won, so tennis is kind of funny that way,” said Swiatek.

“But I’m really happy that we won it as a team, because it was kind of on my checklist, you know.”

Iga Swiatek’s record at the United Cup

Swiatek lost as many singles matches at this year’s United Cup as she had in the three previous editions of the tournament.

However, that didn’t stop Poland from lifting their first title.

With the United Cup ticked off Swiatek’s ‘checklist’, what else is there for the 24-year-old to win?

Six tournaments Iga Swiatek still needs to win

To ‘complete’ women’s tennis, you need to win 18 titles.

The four Grand Slams, the 10 WTA 1000s, the WTA Finals, the Billie Jean King Cup, the United Cup, and the Olympics.

Swiatek has won 12 of those 18 titles.

She still needs to win the Australian Open, Olympics, Billie Jean King Cup Finals, the Dubai Tennis Championships, the Canadian Open, and the Wuhan Open.

You can imagine Swiatek winning the remaining WTA 1000 titles over the coming years, but the other three could prove more difficult.

Swiatek has come so close yet so far at the Australian Open on several occasions.

Where do you think she will be ranked?

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Last year, Swiatek was a point away from reaching the final down under before losing to the eventual champion, Madison Keys.

The Pole has the quality required to win the title, but whether she can put it all together for two weeks in Melbourne is another story.

Another title Swiatek may struggle to get her hands on is the Olympics.

As the event only comes around once every four years, she won’t get too many chances to claim gold.

Losing to Qinwen Zheng in Paris two years ago, Swiatek had to settle for bronze on her favorite surface, and must now set her sights on LA 2028.

Finally, Swiatek will need to win the Billie Jean King Cup.

Poland have several strong players, including Magda Linette and Magdalena Frech, but like the rest of the world, face an uphill battle in upsetting the two-time defending champions Italy.

She won’t want to concern herself with any of that right now, though, as Swiatek prepares for her Indian Wells opener against either Francesca Jones or Kayla Day later this week.