Janko Tipsarevic: Reader, thinker, DJ… aspiring Slam winner

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  • He’s been dubbed the philosopher of the ATP tour, and rumoured to have the highest IQ in tennis.

    He sports a unique look, playing with distinctive eyewear and has several tattoos that quote famous authors and thinkers. One tattoo on his left arm reads ‘beauty will save the world’ – a phrase borrowed from Dostoevsky.

    But while Janko Tipsarevic initially made headlines years ago for his intellect, it was only a matter of time before his tennis commanded attention and the Serb has now become a regular fixture at the top of the world rankings since making his top-10 debut in November 2011.

    He may be comfortable discussing his ruthless backhand down-the-line but when you question Tipsarevic about how smart he is, he is almost shy in his response. “They are lying I promise you,” he says with a laugh. “I think I had a really high IQ when I was really young but I haven’t done a test since then.

    “First of all I think I speak really good English so maybe that’s why people think I’m smart and second of all I think they connect these dots with part of my life when I was reading a lot of philosophy and then they think ‘oh wow, if this guy reads philosophy then he has to be smart’. I’m not saying I’m stupid but I’m not saying that this has any real connection.”

    The 28-year-old is in the form of his life and opened his season with a title win in Chennai last week. But the cerebral Belgradian also has an eye on a future after tennis. “These days I’ve switched from philosophy more to a little bit of business and marketing and management,” he explains. “I want to get my Masters degree in sports management in Serbia, and if I’m not reading about that, I’m reading a little bit of psychology but more sociology, like human relationships and stuff like that.

    “I can tell you that I will stay connected to sport and will stay connected to tennis (after retirement). I opened up an agency together with my manager, managing a few up-and-coming kids around the world but mainly in Serbia, so this is one of the options which I might pursue when I stop playing.”

    But of course it is far too premature to be discussing retirement plans with Tipsarevic. The Serbian world No9 is a baseline mastermind. Punishing on both his forehand and backhand he has taken out names like Andy Roddick and Marat Safin in Grand Slams. He also stretched Roger Federer to five sets in the third round of the 2008 Australian Open before falling 8-10 in the final set.

    He has won four titles and made seven more finals, and having won the Australian Open as a junior, he’s hoping he can go far in Melbourne this month. Tipsarevic starts his campaign with an intriguing opening round clash with Lleyton Hewitt later on Monday, but he has ambitions of going much further than that.

    He came agonisingly close to making his first Grand Slam semi-final at the US Open last September when he lost to David Ferrer in a fifth set tie-break in what was possibly one of the best matches of 2012. Tipsarevic says that match still stings a little. “It does haunt me but not as much as people think it does,” he says.

    “There are a few matches in 2012 that hurt me much more, but in that match I know that I basically died on the court, I gave everything I had, I had nothing left in me after that match. I was saving a lot of matches with match points down, set points down. You cannot forget these things. When you lose a match like that it sticks with you probably for the rest of your life but it doesn’t haunt me that much because I really did everything I could.”

    He prefers to see the positive side of experiencing that epic battle: “It gives me belief that I can make a semi-final at a Grand Slam. Rafa (Nadal) pulled out of the Australian Open which means that I will probably be the No8 seed. That means nothing because you will always have tough competition in this tournament, but if there’s a window, there’s an opening for me, I’m ready to use my chance.”

    Chatting with Tipsarevic, it is hard not to talk about one of his other big passions – house music. While he says he can’t go to clubs as often as he would like, being a committed tennis player, he still manages to squeeze in a show here and there and frequently exchanges tweets with some of the world’s best DJ’s, be it Bob Sinclar or Steve Angello of Swedish House Mafia.

    He says: “I do DJ sometimes. Every time I have a chance. But I’m more professional than ever so going out to a disco is something which I can’t afford very often. But every time I do, I try to sneak into the DJ booth and play a little bit.

    “These guys are my idols, I tell you,” he says of his DJ friends. “When I meet them or spend some time with them I feel like a groupie, it’s a dream come true for me. Music is just a hobby, I don’t imagine myself traveling around the world DJ-ing.

    “Making a performance or a song is much tougher than it actually seems on stage. You see those guys pushing all these buttons and you think, ‘oh this guy has it easy’, but it’s not really like that. It’s way tougher than it seems.”

    Luckily for us, Tipsarevic is sticking to tennis and judging from his performances in Abu Dhabi and Chennai the past couple of weeks, he might just do some damage in Australia over the next fortnight.

    JANKO TIPSAREVIC FACTFILE

    Born: June 22, 1984, Belgrade

    Turned Pro: 2002 World ranking: 9 Career won/loss: 249/192

    Best Slam performances: US Open – quarter-finals (2011, 2012), Wimbledon – 4th round (2007, 2008), French Open – 4th round (2012), Australian Open – 3rd round (2008, 2012)

    Did you know? Tipsarevic is married to TV host Biljana Sesevic and spent his honeymoon in the UAE.   

    His fellow Serb and good friend Novak Djokovic: “Janko has had the best two years of his life. He’s very committed and his goals and ambitions get higher each year. We’re great friends. I’ve known him since I was 11 years old. We grew up more or less in the same tennis club in Serbia. I was watching him as a role model in our country because he is four years older than me and was very successful in junior competitions.”

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