ljubicics tennis blog

This is the life of a tennis player on the run! I brought all my luggage to the courts with me this morning knowing that if I made it through to the final I would need to rush straight from the courts to the airport to catch my 11.30 pm flight to Melbourne. With the final starting not before 6.30pm it could have been tight if the final went three sets. And after the match there is the trophy ceremony and press commitments.

I nearly had all the time in the world to catch the flight! I was down one match point in my semifinal against Kristof Vliegen. That match started at 12 o'clock and I scraped out with a 6-3, 3-6, 7-6(6) win. Then in the final I beat Carlos Moya 7-6(6), 6-2.

It's been a fantastic week. I really enjoyed the food, the hotel and the organization was great. To finish the week as a winner is great. I have a bad record in finals and that's why I wanted this title so much. I didn't want people to think of me as a guy who always lost finals.

I had some tough matches to reach the final. Then against Moya I was down 4-0 in the first-set tie-break and then down two set points at 6-4 before coming back to win the set. The second set was some of the best tennis I've played in the past couple of months.

To play my best tennis of the week in the final is a great way to start the year. I thought my 2005 was fantastic but I have started 2006 even better. I hope that is a sign of things to come for the season. Physically I feel okay. No complaints at all. I hope my body will survive as I have a heavy schedule planned.
I hope the blog is going to bring luck to the other players as it has brought it to me. I'm going to play a couple of exhibition matches next week in Kooyong against some great players, so it will be a good lead-in to the Australian Open. But it's not an official tournament so the mood will be much more relaxed. Melbourne is a very nice city and I have seen a lot of it in previous years. I have some relatives in Melbourne and they will take me around. It should be a fantastic week.

Thanks for reading my blog this week. I hope you've enjoyed it.

Ivan

The roll of her life


One day after winning the first World Cup downhill of her career, Janica Kostelic replicated the performance at Bad Kleinkirchheim's super-G. The world No. 1 danced for joy in the finish area after becoming only the third woman in cup history to win races in all of the sport's five disciplines.



Kostelic roars right back
Mission to Torino: Anja v Janica
Déja-vu all over again
Kostelic, the overall World Cup leader who has three Olympic gold medals to defend in Sestriere next month, follows in the tracks of Swede Pernilla Wiberg and Austrian Petra Kronberger who triumphed in all disciplines during the 1990s.

"I can't believe it yet," Kostelic told reporters in the finish area. "I am so happy, especially as I didn't have a good feeling about the super-G."

Michaela Dorfmeister, the super-G World Cup champion, shared second place with her Austrian team mate Alexandra Meissnitzer, 0.10 seconds behind Kostelic. Both led the World Cup standings in the discipline at the beginning of the day.

World champion Anja Paerson of Sweden set the fastest time on the top of the Franz Klammer course but skidded round the side of a gate as she neared the bottom and went out. She left the competition area without speaking to reporters.

Her exit allowed Kostelic to pull well ahead at the top of the overall cup standings with 982 points. Dorfmeister overtook Paerson, last season's overall winner, for second place with 730.

Former overall cup champion Dorfmeister, who made the podium in all three races in Bad Kleinkirchheim, went down on one knee in front of Kostelic in the finish area.

"What she is doing now is something completely amazing," the Austrian said of her rival. "I wanted to show her."

Dorfmeister, 32, is delighted with her own form in what she has said will be her final season.

"I just can't explain what is happening to me this season, I am just having a perfect series of races," said Dorfmeister who won the previous super-G in Val d'Isere last month.

"I don't want to think about it, I just want to enjoy it. My last season is definitely something special."

Meissnitzer, who won the season's first super-G in Lake Louise in December, also paid tribute to Kostelic.

"How can I complain about being second on the podium behind Janica Kostelic?" she said. "It means a lot because right now she is definitely the girl of the week."

Kostelic, 24, has now won 24 World Cup races and will be a favourite in every event at the Feb. 10-26 Winter Olympics in Italy.

"My form is definitely very good now, I don't have to change anything," she said. "The only think I have to do from now on is to train."

Ancic is also though to the third round
keep it up guys !!!!