Rune: The Soaring Star Who Never Stops Believing

This July, Holger Rune’s rapid rise had come to a screeching halt.

A 2021 Intesa Sanpaolo Next Gen ATP Finals competitor, Rune’s season had started well. The teen, who began the year outside the Top 100 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings, quickly climbed into the Top 50 by lifting his first ATP Tour trophy in Munich and advancing to the Roland Garros quarter-finals. The only player younger than the Dane in the Top 50 was Carlos Alcaraz.

But what seemed a bump-free road revealed potholes. After losing to Casper Ruud in the last eight on the Parisian clay, Rune lost seven consecutive matches. For nearly two months, he did not win a set against a Top 100 player.

“It was tough for sure. When you lose a couple of matches in a row, you’ve got to get back at it and you have [to think about] your goals that you want to achieve. But I think it’s normal in a way,” Rune told ATPTour.com. “It’s going up and then sometimes it’s going a little bit down. You’ve got to accept it because this is sports. Everybody can beat everybody, so it’s just about accepting it and keep believing.

“[To] keep having belief is the most important. That’s also what kept me going. I’m basically a guy who is very motivated no matter what happens, so that’s one thing that is also helping me.”

In Hamburg, the 19-year-old lost his sixth straight match. He remembers thinking to himself about what was happening.

“It was really not a nice feeling,” Rune told ATPTour.com. “I kind of told myself that, ‘I still have to be motivated and get back to practice.’ As soon as I got back to practice, because I love tennis so much, I was just super motivated and then I was excited for the American swing and there I got things going a little bit again.”

After reaching the third round of the US Open and the quarter-finals in Metz, Rune won 19 of his next 21 matches. He made the final in Sofia, triumphed in Stockholm, advanced to the championship match in Basel and earned the best result of his career in Paris, where he claimed his maiden ATP Masters 1000 crown.

Rune not only won the Rolex Paris Masters, but he did it in style, becoming the first player since the inception of the ATP Tour (1990) to claim five Top 10 victories at a tournament outside the Nitto ATP Finals. He clawed past in-form Novak Djokovic in the final.

^{Photo Credit: Corinne Dubreuil/ATP Tour}
Patrick Mouratoglou, who officially joined Rune’s team in October, was impressed by the Dane’s bounceback.

“It shows about his character that he can bounce back and that’s also what we say about champions,” Mouratoglou told ATPTour.com. “It’s not about what they win, it’s about how they bounce back when they’re in trouble. So I think it’s a good indicator about his personality, how strong it is, how much he wants it and how much he’s able to bounce [back].

“A champion is able to bounce back during a match when he’s in trouble, during a season when he’s in trouble. They’re able to find within themselves the necessary strengths to find the solutions to inverse a difficult situation.”

With his big win in Paris, Rune broke into the world’s Top 10. Although he is happy with his progress, Rune has long spoken about his dreams of becoming World No. 1. What will it take to get there?

“It’s definitely to keep improving a lot. Keep improving my serve, return, everything that’s possible. And it is the same with the mental side: keep staying composed in those important moments, being brave,” Rune said. “There are a lot of small things that are so important.

“Also now that I have been in the Top 10, it’s going to be even harder because people start to know my game more, so I have to keep improving. “It’s going to be fun and a great experience.”