Dominic Thiem says he does not want to define himself by his results anymore as he believes that approach is damaging to his mental health. Thiem, a former world No 3, is having a rough start to the 2023 season as he is just 1-6 at the start of the year.
This Monday, Thiem suffered another very disappointing loss as Thiago Monteiro beat the Austrian 6-1 3-6 7-6 (2) in the Rio de Janeiro first round. Thiem, now ranked at No 96 in the world, is far from the game that was once making him one of the very best players in the game.
“I was defining myself only by results for a long time, which is not mentally healthy. I’m going to do my best in every match, what will happen I can’t predict,” Thiem said, per the Rio Open Twitter account.
Thiem sobre querer retomar sua melhor forma: “Eu estava me definindo só por resultados por muito tempo, o que não é mentalmente saudável.
Eu vou dar o meu melhor em cada jogo, o que vai acontecer eu não posso prever.” #RioOpen — Rio Open (@RioOpenOficial) February 21, 2023
What happened to Thiem?
After losing in his first three Grand Slam finals, Thiem finally became a Grand Slam champion at the 2020 US Open.
In the aftermath of his US Open victory, Thiem started to struggle with his game and form. Then, Thiem suffered a wrist injury in the June of 2021 – that injury sidelined him for the next 10 months. Earlier this month, Thiem admitted that “the fire went out” after he accomplished his goal of becoming a Grand Slam champion.
“It went out after the US Open. But we’ve already talked about that. I don’t want to blame myself for that. There are players who celebrate great success who are spurred on by that, who are pushed even further to perform even better, who are immediately on fire to win the next Grand Slam title.
It wasn’t like that for me, I’m a different guy. It took me a while before I accepted that, that I’m a bit harder on myself than some others. What I certainly also had to learn is that it is only up to me and I have to regulate it myself,” Thiem recently told Kronen Zeitung.
