Jack Draper insists his main goal is to keep improving his tennis after claiming his first Masters 1000 title in Indian Wells on Sunday.
The British 23-year-old stormed to a comprehensive 6-2, 6-2, win over Denmark’s Holger Rune to lift the biggest trophy of his career. Draper also scored wins over two-time champion Carlos Alcaraz, Taylor Fritz, Ben Shelton, Jenson Brooksby and Joao Fonseca earlier in the tournament to become the fourth player born in the 2000s to win a Masters 1000 title. The other three to do so are Rune, Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner.
Following his breakthrough run, Draper broke into the PIF ATP Top 10 on Monday and is now in seventh position. In ATP history, the only British player to achieve this at a younger age than him is Andy Murray, who did so at 19.
“I feel like I have achieved a lot in the last year, and it’s been nothing to do with setting goals,” said Draper, who won two Tour titles and reached the US Open semi-finals last year.
“Setting goals and saying you’re going to do something, it’s important to believe it, but if you’re not putting in the work and putting in the sacrifice and the days of consistency together, then you’re not going to achieve anything.”
Despite his rapid rise in recent months, Draper believes he still has plenty of work to do with his team. He is coached by James Trotman, who has been working with him since 2021. Also in his team is Physio Shane Annun, strength and conditioning coach Matt Little and coach Alex Ward joins him for 12 weeks of the season to assist Trotman.
“Me and my coach, we wake up each day and try approaching practice, approaching everything I do in a very structured way and a very consistent way so that I don’t have many bad days,” Draper explained.
“So when I do maybe have a bad day, my level is still very high.
“I want to be a great player and I want to achieve amazing things in this sport, but my main goal is to keep on improving and keep on knuckling down. I know there is a long way ahead of me. I’m very ambitious. I don’t want to just stop here. I want to keep on going.”
Draper has a win-loss record of 13-2 so far this season with four of those victories being over top 20 players (all in Indian Wells). He will return to action at the Miami Open later this week which is the last major hardcourt event to take place before the clay swing.
