Jack Draper: I used to be a mouth breather – but breathing coach has made me stronger

Jack Draper’s transformation from tennis sick call to iron man at Melbourne Park has been inspired by an unexpected ally: a breathing coach who encourages him to use his nose instead of his mouth.

Ever since his very first appearance on the ATP Tour, when he collapsed on court in Miami and was forced to retire, Drape has been sensitive to heat and stress.

Two years ago, in the first round of the Australian Open, he gave a rusty Rafael Nadal all sorts of problems until he started cramping early in the third set. So at this same tournament last season, he threw up in a trash can after scoring a maiden five-set win over USA’s Marcos Giron.

But this tournament has been very different. Despite coming into the event without any match play behind him, due to a hip problem that disrupted his off-season, Draper has fought back from two sets to one down in three consecutive games without needing so much as a medical time-out.

He has already spent just over 12½ hours on the court, five hours more than his next opponent Carlos Alcaraz (who he faces at 4.30am GMT on Sunday morning). And he has never stopped chasing every ball with manic energy. “I say, ‘Come on, just relax,'” his latest victim, Aleksandar Vukic, said Friday night.

the same evening, Drape revealed that some of his newfound poise can be attributed to his breathing coach. “Having my hip off, I was able to focus on working on a few different things,” he said. “I worked a lot with a breathing coach and just tried to understand it a little better.

“I had a lot of problems with my sinuses when I was younger,” Draper added, “so I breathe through my mouth a lot. When you’re anxious or when you have long points and you need to recover quickly, it’s not effective to breathe through the mouth.

“I’ve been trying to reverse what I’m doing and breathe through my nose a lot better and a lot more,” continued Draper, who is only the fourth player to win three straight five-setters at the Australian Open this century.

“Sometimes you don’t realize how tight your body is. Especially me because I’ve always been someone who likes to try hard and I think sometimes you have to relax. Especially in tennis , because you have to be free to let your muscles do what they need to do. If you’re tense all the time, you won’t last too long.”

The appointment was originally suggested by Draper’s head coach James Trotman, who has guided his career with tremendous skill to date. The respiratory trainer has traveled out to Australia for this event and she has supported him throughout.

Draper’s no-nonsense approach to his own health and fitness has helped him live up to his No. 1 seeding. 15 and thus achieve a meeting with world no. 3 Alcaraz. However, he will not be happy with the scheduling as he was hoping to play in the evening again, which would have given him a few hours of recovery time.

Instead, 10-time Australian Open champion Novak Djokovic has been allocated the night slot, likely because he wanted to avoid the heat of what is expected to be the hottest day of the tournament so far, with temperatures due to rise to 31 degrees Celsius.

Draper’s afternoon slot – which starts at 3.30pm local time – will make it even harder for him to pull another rabbit out of the hat against Alcaraz. “Hopefully they’ll put me in late against Alcaraz,” Draper had requested Friday night — or Saturday morning, actually, because he didn’t arrive in the interview room until 8 p.m. 2 a.m. after his 4½-hour match with Vukic.

“I have to be aggressive,” he added when asked about the specific challenges Alcaraz will present him. “I have to take my chances. Against the top players, you get fewer and fewer chances to win games and sets and all that kind of stuff.

“I have to be brave in the way I play, but I expect him to come out knowing that I’ve played three five-setters and that he’s got a match on his hands. It’s going to be a great competition, it’s I sure.”

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