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parsed(2025-05-13) - pubdate: 05/25
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pub date: 1747112400
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The Warrior

Rafael Nadal and His Kingdom of Clay

May 13, 2025 | Hardcover
ISBN: 9781538759134
$42.00
Reader Reward Price: $37.80 info
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Description

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Master comes an intimate biography of tennis's enduring champion Rafael Nadal. 

In The Warrior, Christopher Clarey illuminates the skill and determination it took to accomplish Rafael Nadal's most mind-blowing achievement: 14 French Open titles. Nadal has won big  on tennis's many surfaces en route to becoming one of the greatest players of all time: securing two Wimbledon titles on grass and four U.S. Open titles on cushioned acrylic hardcourts. But clay, the slowest and grittiest of the game's playgrounds, is where it all comes together best for his tactical skills, whipping topspin forehand and gladiatorial mindset. Clay is to Rafael Nadal what water is to Michael Phelps, which helps explain one of the most impressive individual sports achievements of the 21st century. 

Clarey draws on interviews over many years with Nadal and his team and with rivals like Roger Federer. Not just a book about tennis, The Warrior draws much wider lessons from Nadal's approach to competition.

About this Author

Christopher Clarey was the longtime tennis columnist and global sports correspondent for the New York Times and International Herald Tribune, covering more than 100 Grand Slam tournaments and 15 Olympics.

ISBN: 9781538759134
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 368
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2025-05-13

Reviews

"A scintillating account of the elastic Spaniard's epic run to the pinnacle of men's professional tennis."--Wall Street Journal Book Review

"The definitive volume on the definitive clay court player of all time."--Vogue

"Christopher Clarey wrote what is widely regarded as the definitive book on Roger Federer: The Master. Now he has produced a similarly authoritative book on Federer's longtime rival and friend, Rafael Nadal: The Warrior. The book tells the story of both Nadal and clay-court tennis, using the Spanish great's relationship with Roland Garros, the French Open, as its frame."--The New York Times

"A wonderful addition to the canon of great tennis books... offers new insight into Nadal's unprecedented dominance on clay courts."--Town & Country

"Shrewd and informative."--The Times

"[Christopher Clarey] is well positioned to write Nadal's biography, having already penned The Master: The Brilliant Career of Roger Federer. Clarey can thus be called the Walter Isaacson of sports biographers - and we now await his verdict on Djokovic." 
 --The Federal

"Though the narrative focuses on Nadal, Roland-Garros's clay courts become a character in their own right as Clarey provides rich background on the event's history... It's a meticulous recap of one of tennis's great achievements."--Publishers Weekly

"This insightful, wide-ranging book could serve as a model for other sports biographers.... An inspired portrait of an unusually dominant athlete."--Kirkus Reviews

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