Hong Kong champion Bublik on celebratory beers, 24 hours in Vegas and doomed major mission

After every win in Hong Kong last week, Alexander Bublik would retire to the same Japanese restaurant and savour a “beautiful pint of beer”.\nBublik’s drink on Sunday night would have tasted especially satisfying, after his victory over Lorenzo Musetti in the Bank of China Hong Kong Tennis Open final elevated him to a career-high No 10 world ranking.\nHe has five tournament wins in seven months; a late-career surge the 28-year-old partially attributes to the birth of his son Vasily in August 2022.\n“At the beginning, I didn’t feel that much, but once he started speaking and understanding, and being really attached to me, I realised that when I was leaving home he was missing me,” Bublik told the Post.\n“And I miss him and my wife a lot. If I play well, I can go to fewer tournaments [because I’m not chasing ranking points] and have more time to dedicate to family, friends and myself, which is very important.”\n\nBublik said his wish to be on court more sparingly should not be mistaken for a lack of appetite for his sport.\nAhead of a Monday flight to Melbourne for next week’s Australian Open, he said it would not make sense for him to continue “if I didn’t enjoy it”, especially with career earnings topping US$10 million in prize money alone.\n“I have a beautiful home [in Monaco], people who love me, and people I love,” he added. “If I didn’t want to go to Melbourne I wouldn’t go. Why push if you’re going to go on court and torture yourself?”\nBublik has won 34 and lost only nine matches since his best grand slam performance last June, when he reached the French Open quarter-finals.\nRegardless, he does not believe winning the Australian Open this month is a realistic possibility.\n“Grand slams are a different beast, it’s two weeks of five-set matches, it’s demanding,” Bublik said. “If I could win a couple of matches, be happy, stay healthy and continue the season, that would be a win.”\nAfter Bublik first entered the world’s top 20, in May 2024, he betrayed his carefree nature to fixate on practise and chasing lofty goals. He duly lost 18 of his next 22 matches to tumble to world No 82.\nWhen that run culminated in a first-round defeat to world No 349 Yosuke Watanuki in Indian Wells last March, Bublik was minded to quit. Before his next tournament in Phoenix, the player’s team told him not to train.\n“If you can’t win against a guy who’s 300 in the world, you’ve got to change something,” he said.\n\nBublik switched to a new racquet and enjoyed a hedonistic stopover in Las Vegas.\n“I was there fewer than 24 hours, we arrived in the morning, went to a restaurant, gambled a bit, slept over, went back to a restaurant, then to Phoenix,” he said.\n“It’s a nice story, but the biggest factor for me was the racquet change.”\nSuddenly recapturing a formidable game that blends big serving, blinding ground strokes and a deft touch, the 6ft 5in (1.96m) Bublik reached the final in Phoenix. He was a champion two months later in Turin, then added titles in Halle, where he beat Jannik Sinner in the second round, Gstaad and Kitzbuhel.\nIn Hong Kong, he dropped only one set in four matches and fired a tournament-high 46 aces.\n“I will stick to my routine [unlike after reaching top 20] and try to be next to my family more,” he said. “It really humbles you and stops you thinking too much about stadiums, rankings and the financial side.”\nWhatever happens he will not stop the post-match drinks, nor change his views on winning a grand slam, despite the fact Goran Ivanisevic and Stan Wawrinka claimed their first majors at 29 and 28, respectively.\n“I was never trained to be a grand slam champion,” he said. “Maybe I had that dream when I was 12, but as I’ve got older I’ve realised it’s more important to enjoy what I do. Although if I get there through five retirements, I’m taking that.”\n