Journeywoman tennis player Nadia Petrova has raised the bar for international tennis, vowing to give a googolplex per cent ahead of the French Open, Wimbledon and US Open tournaments.
“For most of my career I’ve been happy giving 110 or 120 per cent,” the Russian world No.9 told thebladder.com.
“In fact, now that I think about it, in my junior years in Moscow, I often gave as little as 95-100 per cent. Hah! How naďve I was,” she said.
“Back then, in my ignorance I used to think that all you could aim for was to give all you possibly could, playing your heart out and leaving everything out on the court.
“Now I see that that was foolish. You’ve got to give everything you have, somehow go back off the court and find more than you had originally, then come back onto the court and give that too.
Petrova said her ranking wallowed in the 40s for a number of years, before she tuned in to a Serena Williams press conference and learned that the top players were now giving upwards of 120 per cent – in Serena’s case a peak of 210 per cent at the height of her success in 2001-02.
“I was raised to respect mathematical principles,” Petrova said. “But I began to realise that for a professional sportsperson, that was unacceptable.
“I began to give 140, 150, then 160 per cent, laughing in the face of number laws and mocking so-called inviolable rules. But I was still coming up against girls like Amelie Mauresmo who were bringing 180 per cent-plus. That’s when I thought, ‘Fuck it – I’m raising the bar’.”
“A googolplex is one followed by 10 to the power of 100 zeroes,” she added. “That’s how much per cent I’ll be giving. Bring it, Williams.”
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Tennis player to give googolplex per cent
