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Tennis legend Roger Federer chatted with “Extra’s” Mona Kosar Abdi at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival premiere of his new documentary “Federer: Twelve Final Days.” He reflected on his storied career and also opened up about his family life now that he’s retired.
He said of the doc, “This movie has been a very personal journey of course for me, so it’s great to celebrate it, my career, maybe one more time. It’s like therapy for me, so it’s great to see people coming out and being so excited.”
Talking about life off the court, he said, “Retirement is great. It was smooth. I had a little bit of luck, unfortunate luck, with my knee. My knee was getting worse and worse, so I think I got a feeling and a taste of how life was going to be once I’m retired, being home more and so forth.”
Federer continued, “It’s been really smooth, super happy in my life. We have four beautiful children. There are twin boys that are 10, twin girls that are 14, and then my wife. We’ve just been traveling around the world, having the best time, and obviously helping them with school, and then having projects like this one. So, I’m keeping busy with that and it’s been wonderful.”
In one part of the doc, Federer gets choked up talking about what’s next after tennis. He shared how he has always tried to maintain perspective about that.
Roger reflected, “I always felt that career could always end with any injury, and it’s only tennis, I always tried to remind myself.”
He recalled, “Every time I won a match or a tournament, especially a tournament, I knew it could be my last, and so you always have to live it in a life where one day you’ll be home and then you will not be a tennis play anymore. You will only be a former tennis player. And I think that mindset has helped me not being, like, too worried about the afterlife of tennis. It’s been a great transition. I’m very happy and I’m happy it was the way it was supposed to be for me.”
Mona asking him, “What would you tell the young kid who was a ball boy?”
“Get ready for a great life and a very enjoyable ride, a lot of times in the spotlight, under pressure trying to save break points and trying to say the right things on a red carpet or in a press conference,” he answered. “But you’re gonna have a great time and you kind of wish it’s going to go on forever, but everything has a has an end point. I’m happy I was able to last as long as I did in the in the public eye under pressure, you know, on the biggest courts of the world. It’s been an absolute dream career. I couldn’t be any more happier.”
The athlete also spoke about having his wife Mirka by his side through the whole tennis journey and now in this new chapter.
He shared, “The good thing is we started dating when I was about 18 and a half, 19. I was super young at the time, and so we’ve spent a whole life basically together already. We had the first half of my career without kids, the second half then with kids, so logistics were insane. So now obviously life is completely different, but we’re happy that we’re back to better routines, let’s say. No match the next day, no practice the next day, so you’re much more relaxed, I think, at home. But of course the kids keep us extremely busy. I mean, school work for them now is very intense, so we try to help them as much as we can together.”
Roger is still watching the game and reacted to the French Open finals, saying, “Amazing victory for Carlos [Alcaraz], also a great finals for Zverev. Also, the semis were fantastic. I love watching the French Open, watching any tournament for that matter.”
He added, “Yesterday, unfortunately, I couldn’t watch the finals because I was the commencement speaker at Dartmouth College, so I was very busy myself trying to give a good message to all the students. But what a what a career Carlos has already had, and the tour is in good hands with all the young players coming through. I’m still a big tennis fan. I’m happy I’m checking results every day. It’s not like I’m happy to be gone, not at all.”
And he has no regrets, saying, “I think you need to have the losses and the mistakes made, and in the moment I thought it was the right decision.”
He continued, “Honestly, I don’t dwell on the past. My career has been so much better than I ever thought. I would have been happy with just having a center court appearance, let alone winning Wimbledon, so I’ve achieved so much more than I ever thought I would have. So no, no regrets there.”
“Federer: Twelve Days” is on Prime Video June 20.