Photo: si.robi via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped. This adapted image is also licensed CC BY-SA 2.0.
Hubert Hurkacz has won his first title on clay. The vegan Polish world No. 10 beat Spain's Pedro Martínez 6-3, 6-4 in the final of the Estoril Open in Portugal on Sunday, April 7.
One break in the fourth game was enough to take the first set, which he closed with a hold to love, and he broke again in the opening game of the second before serving it out, Tennis Majors reports. It is his first ATP title of the season and the eighth of his career.
It is a piece of Polish history too. Hurkacz is the first Polish man to win a main tour title on clay since Wojciech Stuchlik in 1981 (tournament record). On the way to the final he beat qualifiers Jan Choinski and Pablo Llamas Ruiz and Chile's Cristian Garín, while Martínez had knocked out top seed Casper Ruud in the semi-finals.
In his winner's speech Hurkacz thanked the people around him:
I want to thank my team. I really appreciate you guys. Even in the tough moments you still stick with me. That's really amazing. I want to thank my family, they've always supported me since I was a kid.
Hurkacz has followed a vegan diet for several years, and the ATP Tour ran a feature on his food under the title "Food Court: Hubert Hurkacz's Vegan Diet". Funnily enough, he wasn't a natural. He told the ATP that "when I was a kid, I didn't like salad at all and I didn't like most of the veggies" (as quoted on Wikipedia).
He likes them now. With titles on hard courts, grass and clay, there isn't a surface left that he hasn't won on.
In October Hurkacz won the Shanghai Masters, his second Masters 1000 title after Miami in 2021, and in 2022 he beat Daniil Medvedev to win in Halle on grass. Last month vegan skater Kristen Santos-Griswold became 1000m world champion in Rotterdam.
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