When I met Coco Gauff in 2019, the 15-year-old talked about her exams, her parents and her ambition to be the greatest tennis player of all time.
She had just qualified for Wimbledon and was about to face her heroine Venus Williams in the first round. Her eyes seemed wide with wonder, but half-closed at the same time.
It was clear that this eloquent teenager was something special, but no one was prepared for the sporting and cultural phenomenon that was about to be unleashed.
Five years later, we meet again on the same day, the Saturday before Wimbledon, to reflect on that extraordinary debut at the Championships and what has happened since then.
Gauff is now a Grand Slam champion and has transcended tennis since, as a 16-year-old, she passionately addressed a crowd outside Delray Beach City Hall following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
Coco Gauff, who won the US Open last year, wants to win at least ten Grand Slams
Gauff reflected on her extraordinary Wimbledon debut at the age of 15 in 2019
In 2019 she was wearing workout gear, but now Gauff is dressed like the superstar she’s become: cascading braids dyed blonde last week, a yellow T-shirt thrown over one shoulder, and that ubiquitous athlete accessory: the hat. fisherman.
Gauff talks about how her career goals have changed, why she’s finally ready to move out of her parents’ house and how remembering that time five years ago helped her win her first Grand Slam title, last year’s US Open.
But first, that summer of 2019, Gauff begins the story on the Gulf Coast of Florida.
“I lost the first round of qualifying in Bonita Springs, a 100km tournament, and Mom and Dad were like, ‘Okay, you have to decide what you’re going to do,’ and then this happened!” she says.
“I remember feeling very confident going into the qualifying round at Wimbledon and knowing I was going to make the main draw. I was drawn with the top seed in the first round and won, and the other two matches were a bit of a blur.
“So obviously the match against Venus was crazy and that was the moment I thought, ‘Maybe my dreams are closer than I thought.'” She appeared on the cover of Teen Vogue magazine a few months later and her charisma , ability and promise to ‘change the world with his racket’ enchanted the public.
“You see those movies about how people’s lives change overnight and you don’t think it’s going to happen to you, but it did,” he says.
“I didn’t think my story would captivate the world so much, but it did and people loved me for it. I loved that people enjoyed watching me play.”
Gauff says she was still able to enjoy her childhood despite her tennis stardom
Gauff seemed like a child in a hurry in 2019, but her rise to the top of the sport has been measured.
Gauff looked like a kid in a hurry in 2019, but her rise to the top of the sport has been measured. Her ranking has progressed each year since 2019: 69, 48, 22, 7, 3. So far this year, she has moved up to No. 2.
Would 15-year-old Coco have been happy with what her 20-year-old self has accomplished?
“I think so,” Gauff replies. “My goal was to win a Grand Slam as a teenager and qualify for Tokyo 2021. Literally after losing in that fourth round at Wimbledon, I set those goals for myself.
‘I am very happy with how I have managed everything. It was not easy.”
That last comment is an indication of the enormous expectation that has become a part of Gauff’s life. He struggled in the first three Grand Slams of the year in 2023, and his worst moment was a first-round loss here. And Gauff reveals how that lowest moment at Wimbledon reminded her of her debut.
“After that first Wimbledon I felt a lot of pressure,” she says. “I felt almost suffocated by expectations, like I wasn’t playing for myself.”
‘Everything changed after I lost here in the first round last year. I realised that this mentality was not sustainable. I felt that if I continued like this, tennis would be unpleasant. I realised that I had to worry about myself and not about the expectations that people have of me.
‘I went back to the mentality I had when I was 15: there was only one match I was nervous about and that was playing against Venus, and it was because it was Venus, not because it was Wimbledon. But in the second, third, fourth round I was never nervous and I feel that way now.
At Wimbledon in 2019, Gauff was only nervous during one match: her victory over Venus Williams.
Having previously wanted to be better than Serena Williams, Gauff now wants to be the best version of herself.
Gauff is now determined to build on her success at last year’s US Open.
Having amassed £12million in prize money, Gauff is now in the process of moving on.
“Obviously there are nerves, but not those suffocating nerves where you think, ‘If I lose, what’s going to happen?’ It’s more like, ‘This is really exciting, I hope I do well.'”
With his new attitude, Gauff should have a serious shot at winning the title this year. His nemesis is Iga Swiatek, but grass is by far the world number one’s weakest surface. World number 3 Aryna Sabalenka has a shoulder injury and back-to-back finalist Ons Jabeur is struggling to regain form. Lifting the Venus Rosewater plate would be a great way for Gauff to start his 20s.
It seems as if the sport that gave Gauff so much with one hand has robbed her of her childhood with the other, but she insists that is not the case.
“I certainly could have still been a girl,” she says. “I probably matured faster than a lot of people, but I think my parents did a good job of trying to keep everything as relaxed as possible, creating an environment where I could still be a child and surround me with people who respected that.”
It has helped that she still lives at home with her parents, despite having racked up £12 million ($15 million) in prize money and much more in endorsements. But that is set to change as she is preparing to buy her own home.
“But not for long!” he responds when asked about living at home. “I’ll still be in Delray, not far away, but not at home. I’m in the process.”
So has Gauff revised her expectations since that 15-year-old, in the same tone in which she said she hoped to get A’s on her exams, told me: ‘I want to be the best of all time, better than Serena’?
Gauff has indeed recalibrated, but unlike almost every other player, he’s happy to talk numbers.
“I want to be the best version of myself,” she responds. ‘When I saw Serena I thought: “There will be no one greater than her.”
‘I definitely want to reach at least double digits in Slams. “I just want to be the best I can be, try to win as many Slams as possible and see where life takes me.”