G'day, it's Gus Walland here, host of Not An Overnight Success, a podcast series brought
to you by our mates at Shore & Partners Financial Services.
Today, I'm talking to Pat Rafter, a man that of course a lot of us know as a tennis legend.
But what I loved about this chat was chatting to him about his little slice of Australia
up there at Byron Bay and what he has done since retiring.
I hope you enjoy it as much as I had the chance to chat to him.
Pat Rafter, welcome to the podcast.
Thanks so much for joining us.
Oh, good to be here, Gus. I know I've heard a lot about you.
So we get to talk some, well, maybe some insightful stuff.
We'll wait and see.
No, I'm looking forward to it, Pat.
I mean, from everyone's point of view, we want to hear, you know,
everything from your childhood, really.
Where did you grow up?
Did you have brothers and sisters?
What were your mum and dad like?
What was your childhood like?
Sort of an interesting one.
So I grew up in Mount Isa, but I've always said one of nine kids.
But, you know, my mum had 10 children and one died at birth.
So he was the ninth child and then mum had another one after that.
So I've always sort of said nine or 10.
I don't really know.
I sort of mix it up sometimes.
Anyway, I'm the seventh child and the times in Mount Isa were great.
It was a lot of fun.
It was a bit crazy as well, as you could imagine.
There's a fair bit of free range to do what you want to do.
A lot to do with the fact that your parents couldn't control nine children.
But it was good times.
Mount Isa was thriving in the 70s.
There was a lot happening.
There was 30,000 people.
Sports was epicenter for that town.
And not just tennis.
It was every single sport you could think of was there.
And everyone played four to 10 sports.
You know, that was just what they did.
And your brothers and sisters, what were they like?
Did you get along well with them?
What was sort of the age gap between the 10 of you?
So boy, girl, boy, girl, boy, girl, boy, boy, boy.
So there was sort of that three year gap between each boy sort of thing.
And then the girls came between at the front end or the top end.
So there was sort of that discrepancy in age where it was sort of broad enough not to have fights,
but that did not matter because the boys are still fought.
And there was punch-ups and all sorts of things going on.
Mainly with some of my older brothers.
Not so much my time and my brother closest to me as well.
We didn't really fight either, but it was on.
It was competitive and there was a lot of niggle and you could just imagine.
I mean, you look back at every family photo.
There weren't many back then, but someone's always crying.
The girls, we weren't, you weren't allowed to punch the girls,
which is obviously fair enough.
So girls had claws.
So the boys decided that they were going to grow their nails.
This is the older brothers.
The only way to get back at the girls was a scratcher.
What were your mom and dad like?
Oh, they're amazing, really hard working, as you could imagine.
Sort of the times, I suppose it was just what they did.
And to have all that, you know, the large family and all those kids,
you needed to work hard to support it.
But times, as my parents would have said, is times were easier
back then in terms of financial to have that bigger family than what it is now.
And saying that it was full on.
My father was an accountant for the mines.
He went there in 64.
And in 1980, we left Mount Isa and we went to the Sunshine Coast.
And obviously, my mom couldn't take a job.
She had two or three kids on her hip the whole time.
So it was not till we moved to the Sunshine Coast to Yamundi.
And my father tried everything, you know, macadamias.
And then he went, we had a strawberry farm.
So my mom was working that all the time and it's backbreaking work.
So and then cattle and all sorts of things.
So they had a go at everything.
I just love the sound of them, mate.
In terms of the sports, you said you played so many, not just tennis.
So was there any other sport that you just loved and were good at or loved?
And you went, oh, I'm not the best at this, but I'm just going to give it a crack.
I thought I was a cad soccer and was whatever you want to call it.
Football, but I'm going to call it soccer.
And that were my times in Mount Isa, which I loved.
And we moved to the Sunshine Coast and I just joined the local team.
And I just sort of never saw the ball.
And I went, oh, this is no fun.
And then tennis was always a big part of our time in Mount Isa.
It was a very big sport for us.
Athletics, I was okay, not great.
So tennis was a sport that was quite highly skilled.
And I decided to take that on.
And you could be a little kid and dominate and be okay.
You could find a way around it where if you weren't a big kid,
generally in athletics or strong or developed,
you weren't going to be anywhere near the finish line when the other guys came over it.
So I think tennis had that sort of opportunity for me to explore those things.
And my older brother played a lot of tennis, one of them in particular, although we all did.
Anyway, he was having a tennis lesson just down the road in a town called Nambour.
And the coach said at the time, and then I would hit the last five minutes.
At the end, I'd go along for his night sessions.
And the coach at the end said, I think this boy might be might have a bit more talent.
And then my father went, all right, let's give him the lesson.
So I got the lessons.
I shafted my older brother.
And that's sort of the way it evolved.
But he was sort of trajectory.
He was on a bit of a trajectory as well.
He wanted to try and play.
And he got a bit of a world ranking in doubles.
He was very close in singles to get one, but he never did.
So he sort of went okay at that type of level.
And the coach, quite often when I talk to athletes,
their first coach is such an important part of their life.
What was the name of this coach and was he super important moving forward for you?
He was Gavin Yarrow was his name.
And what he did is he made tennis fun.
And that's a really big part of it.
You know, when you talk about the development of strokes and shots and things like that,
and that's another really important part of it.
But as a kid, you also have your own technique and your own style.
If you watch tennis a little bit like golf,
people will find their own way to get the ball in the hole or the ball over the net.
So not necessarily every stroke, every technique has to be identical
or the grip change or grips and things.
So I found my own way and Gavin made it really fun for me to play tennis.
And so he was a big part of my life early days.
And then I moved down to Brisbane because I had to be closer.
Because I was at Yamundi, sorry.
We moved in 1984, Mount Isa to Yamundi, which is a little coastal town near Noosa.
And then went to school there for a little bit.
But all my tennis was in Brisbane.
Mum was traveling backwards and forwards two or three times a week,
which is an hour and a half drive either way just for me to play tennis and to train.
So I moved down to Brisbane when I was 14,
lived with the family for about seven months.
And went to school there and trained at the Coops Tennis Center,
which is a great guy called Ashley Cooper, one of our Australian great tennis players.
Him and his brothers had set up a fantastic center there in Brisbane in the 80s.
And that was sort of the epicenter.
And the way tennis worked back then is that you would sign up to be part of a club sort of thing
and you trained with that.
And Coops was that and you paid for that.
You did all that because there wasn't a lot of money in tennis back then like there is now.
I mean, the Australian Open makes so much money
that they can put the infrastructure in now for all these places.
And they pay for the kids and they don't have to do anything in terms of payment.
But back then, that was the way the system worked.
And I went down to Coops and trained there.
And I trained before school from 6.30 to about 8 in the morning.
I'd go to school, come back and train from 3.30 to 5.
And those were my days.
On the weekends, I'd play tennis tournaments.
So that's sort of how my little career there evolved.
Because you had to be in the city because it's just a lot more opportunity
and you need to be with the better players.
And then there's a handful of coaches there that were fantastic.
My next transition was being picked up by Tennis Australia.
And they had sort of an infrastructure which had one coach with three or four players.
And then they would offer some assistance.
And then I was sort of scraping around and I came on their radar when I was about 19 years of age.
And then the next coach who made a big change in my life
was a coach called Bob Carmichael.
And he unfortunately died 10 years ago.
He was a coach for some great top Australian tennis players.
Darren Cahill, one of them.
And then I sort of came under his banner with about three or four of us.
And we trained and worked together.
Richard Fromberg, Jamie Morgan and the Woodies and all those guys.
We all looked out for each other and trained.
And then that's the way the system worked.
The first time you mentioned tennis, it was all about enjoying it and making it fun.
All the way through that process, it gets a little bit more serious.
And you move to Brizzy and you move away from Mount Isa and home and so forth.
Is it still fun or is it starting to be a bit of a mix of,
oh, I could actually make a living out of this.
It's got to be fun, but there's got to be some more hard work as well.
Yeah, good question.
Age 14, 15, I was still a boy playing against men now.
Guys who have developed and I haven't.
So that was a really tricky period for me.
And I was talking to my mom and dad and I just said,
I don't think I'm going to play anymore.
I just can't keep losing first round every tournament I go to.
And going down to the Nationals where there's 64 guys from around Australia
playing and I'm losing first round.
Can't even make my state team all of a sudden.
It's sort of been really left behind.
For some reason, though, it was a really good mix for me
because I wasn't part of a full-time academy,
which the guys, a lot of the kids, young kids do now,
which I do not believe in.
And that is going to school and also playing tennis.
So having a life, still training, doing enough tennis,
but having a life, going to school, mixing and integrating,
doing all those type of things, having conversations outside of just tennis.
And then on the weekends, going off and playing tennis tournaments.
I think those couple of years were pretty vital for me
because I had that mix up.
And then I sort of went through the process for a little bit
and then the 18s came around and I was finishing off high school.
I was still pretty young because I finished high school when I was 16, year 12.
And I wasn't because I was intelligent.
In fact, the exact opposite.
But it had just had, that was the way my birthdate fell in the end of December.
So I finished school and then the next couple of years, I just trained.
I decided that was going to be my pathway,
but I was going to give it a few years.
But there was options, you know, there wasn't just making on the tennis tour.
There could be, I'm going to be a tennis coach.
I'm going to go and play in Germany, join a club over there,
make a little bit of money, be a coach over there, set up, come back.
But back then we had a dream.
We had reachable goals as a kid where he said for $150,000,
I can buy a house in the outer suburbs of Brisbane in the early 90s
and then be set up and go to the pub on a Friday night
and be a tennis coach and all good.
That's life, have a couple of kids.
And that didn't worry me.
I was okay with that.
So that was my fallback.
But the other thing was, all right, let's give this a few more years
and let's have a go.
So in 92 was a bit of a critical year for me.
I'm now on the, been on the road for a couple of years, two and a half years.
I am dragging, I'm sitting around about 300 in the world.
And at that particular time, if you weren't making it through by 1918, 19,
or showing really good signs, you weren't going to make it on the tour.
It does seem young now, but it was sort of the way it was.
And then I went on to have a chat with my mum,
who was overseas with me in Asia.
We did a six-week stint over there.
And I think I broke down with her and started crying.
I think we were at McDonald's in Tokyo somewhere.
I've just lost first round again.
And I just said, I don't think it's for me.
I feel like I've let everyone down.
You know, and mum was there.
She'd been away from the family and all sorts of things.
I just had that expectation that the whole family did not put on me,
but I put on myself what I thought that I needed to do for them.
Or not just them, but just the sacrifice that they made.
So then my mum just said something which I'll never forget was,
you know, you don't notice anything.
It's been a great journey.
I've really enjoyed watching you play.
And there are no expectations you need to put on yourself or anyone else.
And if you choose to stop, then stop.
If you choose to keep playing, then keep playing.
You know, we'll support you.
So all of a sudden, my mind's just going, whoa, hang on.
All those other preconceived ideas I had of what I thought was supposed to be the way
So that allowed me to free up a little bit.
And that year, again, I just sort of went through the motions.
I said, I'll give myself one more year.
And that was a year of 93 where I had a bit of a breakthrough.
I qualified for Wimbledon.
I got to the third round.
I'd qualified for Australian Open 2 that year.
But I got to play center court with Agassi.
I was like, oh my God.
And then I beat Sampras a couple of weeks later in America.
And I'm now top 50 in the world.
And it's like, whoa, OK, now I've made it.
You know, now I can actually, yeah, exactly.
Isn't it incredible how a little chat with mum sometimes can just clear the brain and
actually put everything back into perspective and how these invisible muscles, we call them
at Gotcha for Life, getting mentally fit is as important as getting physically fit,
working on these invisible muscles that are so powerful.
Your mum just freed you up and it allowed you to do what you've,
well, started the process of you doing what you did for so long.
Just imagine if my mum had said, no, no, you know what?
You know, you have let us down or, you know, whatever.
You know, no, no, no, you've got to do this and this.
She just made it so easy for me to make the right decision for me.
Not for her, not for the family, not for anyone else but that.
So that's pretty important.
So you're up and at them.
You start feeling a bit of confidence.
You think, I actually believe that I belong here.
There's a career then.
Everyone sort of knows you as that person that had such a great career,
won majors and so forth.
And we'll get to the Wimbledon final in a moment,
which I'm sure you're sure we're going to ask about.
But Pat, what was it like being on tour?
What was it like being part of that tour before we talk about Davis Cup?
What was it like?
It was, it was what it was.
It was your work.
I guess people see it from the outside of glamour and greatness.
It could be an actor or it could be another sport.
And you just think, oh, how good have they got it?
But it's not that way.
It's your focus on your dreams and your goals.
And you don't really stop and smell the roses that much
because you really don't have the time.
And you're just so focused on it and you do lose perspective.
And I was just so wrapped up in that world.
It's interesting because I was just last night
watching the documentary of the Beckham with my daughter.
How good is that, by the way?
I wasn't sure about him before I started watching the doco.
And by the end of it, I was cheering for him.
I wanted to dive into the Netflix and give him a cuddle.
And I thought she came across fantastic as well.
And it was just such a well-produced documentary.
And my daughter said, was this anything like what you had?
And I said, well, you know, one hundredth of it,
maybe one thousandth of it.
You know, like there was the glimpses of it.
But she's going, you know, I'd love to see something
about what happened with your life.
And I can't really give her a lot.
You know, like I didn't document a lot of it.
There are so many great opportunities that I didn't do
because I was just so selfish and so self-absorbed
in what I was doing.
But at the same time, it was about tennis.
It wasn't about being a name or a global name,
as we would say even now.
He was sort of like a modern day influencer in a way.
I mean, he was bigger than sort of the sport.
And I think he came across bigger than he actually was
You know, he wasn't as good as a lot of those players,
but his name and his presence was.
And I think he'd probably be the first to admit that as well.
However, he had such a massive brand
and obviously an unbelievably good-looking rooster.
And then he played with that too.
I didn't want to play with that.
I didn't have the time to do anything like that.
So could I have sort of formed a different image of me?
But I was just really happy with getting back to my family
when I'd finished or getting back to a week off somewhere
and just chilling out and not worrying about trying
to chase TV shows or things like that.
But I did get on the Letterman show one year
after I won the US Open, which was fun.
And then the next year they said,
can you come on again after I won again in 98?
But I had such a quick turnaround.
I had to get back to Townsville to play a Davis Cup tie
I just couldn't hang around in New York any longer.
So those type of things where you might sit there and go,
yeah, no, no, I'll sit around.
I'll do these TV shows
and I'll sort of do a bit of an outside brand for myself.
Never really played into what I wanted to do.
Just distracted me from my goals of being the best tennis player.
I love the fact that you didn't go on Letterman
so you could get back to the Davis Cup in Townsville.
I think that sums you up perfectly,
which is why so many Aussies love you.
Let's talk about the Davis Cup
before we talk about the Grand Slams.
Mutual father figure in John Newcombe to both of us.
My time with Newk was being Clint's best friend,
living in the same street
and him giving me so much worldly advice as I was growing up,
which I just loved.
And Newk's, I call him my second dad.
And to this day, I just love him so much.
I know he was a massive figure for you as well
and for those Davis Cup boys.
Can you talk us through your love of Davis Cup?
Roche and just what that was like?
Yeah, well, that's a whole other conversation nearly,
but I'll try and condense it as quickly as I can.
So in 94, John Newcombe and Tony Roche
came in as Davis Cup captain and coach.
It was the first time that they'd actually explored
that type of setup.
In the past, it was just one person,
captain and coach, did your business.
So that involvement with those guys,
so Roche was your on-court guy,
worked you really hard
and he got you ready to play tennis.
And there's no fuss about him.
Let's see how hard you can work
and the results will take care of themselves.
And Newk was strategic.
He would work things out
and he'd sort of break you down.
As you know, if you have one or too many wines with Newk,
Jack, I think it is, it comes out.
Yeah, Jack comes out, yeah.
But what it does is open, it's free
and it becomes this different type of conversation.
It becomes very real.
And that's not to say Newk's not real
and normality as well, he is.
And he really gets to the guts of it
and he wants to get to the guts of it.
He wants to break you down.
He wants to see every part of you.
And that's the great thing about Newk.
And I thought those two guys as a combination were amazing.
And I really, I mean, that was what took me
to the next level once again in my career.
And within some of the structures
that happened around it, as I said,
when Roche would get you prepared
and Newk would then sometimes balance you
emotionally and mentally.
So before the US Open, 97,
I'd lost six finals leading in to the US Open
and I was doubting myself.
I'd only won one tournament leading in my whole career
but I'd just made so many finals.
And I was going into another final
but this time it's the US Open
against a guy who I know I can beat,
who I have beat the last few times.
And Newk's going, so how are you feeling?
I said, well, I'm doubting myself
because of how much failure I've had
at the end of a tournament.
And he's pretty well just put my head straight
and that's not good enough.
And this is where we're at
and you've done all this work.
And this is a guy you know how to beat
and you just keep it simple.
These are strategies you should be using.
Roche's got you prepared.
Let's go out and do it.
And that's how it went.
Obviously there's a lot more nerves
and things that came into play.
And then when we went to Davis Cup too,
we had a few little moments too
where having a coach on the court
all of a sudden makes a whole different dynamic
to how you play throughout the year
because you're on your own
and you are playing and working stuff out all the time.
Now you've got a guy on your ear
talking to you every change of ends
about what's happening, what's going on.
And it came a time where I was like,
I mean, no, Nuke, I don't want to deal with it.
And Nuke would just sit back
and he'd just sort of watch it
and he wouldn't say much to me.
He read the room very well.
But in 97, again, the breakthrough year for me,
I was 90 in the world.
I'd had a couple of rough years.
They put me in the Davis Cup against France.
They believed in me to beat Cedric Peerline
And I'm down two sets of love
but I've just lost the second set
after being up like 5-1
and having all these sort of points and opportunities.
And I'm sat down with him and I've just said,
I've just let this match slip.
And he has just really taught me a new one
and he has abused me with every word you can imagine.
And he's just sort of gone to town
and I'm going, oh, God, here we go.
So one of these things he's like,
this is a war of attrition and blah, blah, blah.
And I didn't know what the hell attrition meant.
I go, yeah, okay, Nuke.
But he is, we're drawing a line in the sand
and we're not crossing over.
And this is where you're going to be.
So anyway, I won in five sets
and that was a big turning point
after four hours on the court with him.
And we sort of hugged it all out.
And then at the end of the match,
I said to him, I said, Nuke, I said,
I'm not quite sure what attrition means
but it sounds like nutrition.
So did you want me to banana?
I've got no idea.
Did you want me to have some glucose?
And then he explained to me what attrition meant.
So there came another word in my vocabulary,
which is rather limited,
but he was awesome.
And then we sort of had that unbelievable relationship
where some of the other Davis Cup ties we went through,
we connected with,
and then one tie we had in 99 against Boston,
against America in Boston.
It was a brutally hot day
and he was trying to get through to me.
Again, I'm down two sets of love
and I'm just switched off.
I said, Nuke, I need you to not talk to me right now.
I am really pissed off.
I need to be focused on my own little mind right now.
And he saw it and I got back and ended up winning that
But again, Nuke understood the situation
and knew where my mind was at
and he was very good at reading the room.
So yeah, my hat's off to him.
What was it like playing for Australia,
playing in a team for your country
compared to being like you said a few times already
being out there by yourself,
a very individual sport, of course.
What did you love about Davis Cup
and being part of a team representing Australia?
As my ex-colleagues had always said,
it's your best and worst memories in your career.
And that's so true.
It's everything you want that goes on.
And I would not say I played my best tennis ever
I didn't play my worst tennis either.
I always tried to prepare as well as I could
but I found it quite stressful as well
and sometimes it got the better of me.
And some people really excel in that situation
and others don't.
I don't say I was bad.
I don't say I was great.
I was just somewhere okay.
You know, like I was there.
I wanted to be unbelievable.
I wanted to do so much and to win everything
and to be part of that team and carry the team.
But it's sort of, I don't know,
I would love to say that
but it didn't really work out as well
as I would have hoped to have.
When I speak to people about you,
they say they remember you obviously
being Grand Slam champion a couple of times,
winward and final, of course.
But they always talk about how much
you just put your heart and soul into
Davis Cup and how much you loved Australia.
I did and I wanted to play it.
There was the things you put down
in your schedule every year.
It was Grand Slam's Davis Cup
and then you put tournaments around it
that can make you peak at those particular times.
Especially for Grand Slam,
you could do that for.
Davis Cup was a little bit trickier
how it felt on the schedule to peak.
Sometimes you'd be maybe a little bit overdone
with the amount of tennis
but I always played my best tennis
when I'd played a lot of tennis.
So it never bothered me.
I don't get the way people aren't
passionate about their country
and it's just the way it was.
And I got involved with Davis Cup later
and became the captain for four or five years
and it was pretty miserable to be honest.
I found it very tricky
and there were some guys who just wandered
and passionate and so engaged
and guys like Leighton was still there playing
how much he loves it.
And then a couple other guys just wandered so bad
and other guys just didn't really care.
And I found it so disappointing
and I found that was the same
with every nation around the world.
It was just seemed to be a generational thing.
So Davis Cup needed to change.
Unfortunately, it's probably the wrong change
that's happened right now but I don't know.
Unless the players play, it's got no point.
It's got no relevance
and that's the frustrating part about it.
So let's go to you talk to Nuke.
You're doubting yourself.
You haven't won many finals.
The US Open, here we go.
Talk us through your sleep the day before
and just that particular match
and that day there in New York.
So the first one was 97
and I was playing a guy called Greg Vysetsky in the final.
That particular year was the first year
they ever stopped playing this thing called Super Saturday
and Super Saturday comprised of playing
the men's semis and the women's final on the Saturday
and then the men had to back up next day Sunday
after five sets to play the finals.
And that's just the way it had always been.
97 was the time they experimented with it.
They weren't going to do that.
They were going to actually try to be a little bit fairer
and give the men the semifinals on the Friday,
give them a day off rest, which we normally do
and then play the final on the Sunday.
So it was a new stadium and it was, you know,
the Arthur Ashe Stadium, which is massive,
was the biggest stadium in the world at the time
and it was a whole new scenario.
So I'd beaten Michael Chang, who was going for number one
at that particular time.
In the semifinals very convincingly
and playing it up against Greg Vysetsky.
So I felt like I'd sort of played my final
in the semis in a way,
because I knew whoever was playing the finals,
I felt a bit more comfortable playing.
So I think I stepped okay.
I can't remember if I stepped poorly or not,
but I think I was okay.
It was more the morning of the actual match,
get to the courts, preparing that afternoon.
I'm just going, just doubting myself more than anything,
which I don't think is unusual,
but there's another guy I'm playing against
who we have something to lose.
It seems like you've got more to lose
than you have to gain,
because both of us have this great opportunity
of winning our first grand slam
against guys who are beatable.
He's not playing Sampras,
or at that time Michael Chang,
or Andre Agassi was around,
but he was coming back from his hiatus
from the sport for a little bit.
So I'd beaten him in the fourth round, actually.
He still wasn't at his best yet.
So yeah, the door opened up for me
and it was just mainly just dealing
with those mental demons,
which you put into place,
which I explained earlier.
The 98 one, again, I'd beaten.
We went back to the old super sad day.
I'd played Sampras in the semifinals
and won in five sets on Saturday,
and then I got to play Philippusis on the Sunday,
but I was super chilled.
I was really relaxed that day.
It might've been from the match the day before, too.
I was, I don't know,
I just rocked up to the courts,
knowing I'd beaten Mark the last four or five times,
felt really comfortable again.
And it was a real stress-free match for me.
What was the crowd like in New York?
They call it Zoo York.
I went a couple of years ago
and it's just like, honestly, it's like Cheech and Chong.
There's that much pot around.
They say it's incredible.
So back in the day, that wasn't happening,
but the noise, not quite as respectful perhaps
as other tennis nations because it's New York.
They're there for the scene
and if there's a good match on,
they'll get really engaged.
If there's a bad match on,
they will talk and just let them talk.
You can't really engage too much with them.
I played Andre in that 97 at a night match
and they were loud and boisterous and a bit drunk
and I was sort of getting to some arguments
with some of the crowd.
I was yelling up at them
and I was telling them where to go
and I enjoyed that battle as much as I did with Andre,
but that's the New York crowd.
But, you know, it was fun.
The year I played Pete in the semifinals in 98
was a very interesting dynamic
because I won the year before.
Pete is liked, he's not loved in America, not like Andre.
And so the crowds are a little different
and they were sort of 50-50
and Pete was not happy with the way they were treating him
and he won the first at 7-6
and he's trying to get the crowd up
and half the crowd are getting involved
and I think the other half are going for me.
So it was sort of a funny year.
Pete wasn't real happy so winning that in five.
The finals in a way was sort of a fraction dead
You know, I'm playing Gregg Vysetsky,
Rafter Vysetsky, who in the hell are those two?
Rafter Fulopousis, sort of known from last year.
The other guy, yeah, he's been around a little bit
but, you know, unless you're a tennis enthusiast,
you don't really know.
You're not playing Agassi, you're not playing Becker,
you're not playing big names, you know, that type of thing.
So the crowd probably didn't, you know,
interact as much back then in that situation.
So let's go to Wimbledon.
Incredible, obviously.
I got a great story of Nuke and I at Wimbledon.
I was doing a gap year in England, 1987,
and rang up Clint and Clint was actually dating
Chrissie Evert's sister.
Yeah, mate, this is a weird one.
We met in London, Clint looked ridiculous.
He had stupid clothes on and his hair was all muddled
and I was like I am today, a bit preppy and so forth.
And anyway, I rang up Clint and said, how do I get in?
He goes, mate, just ask for dad at the front gate,
And me being just a little bit, you know, in my bubble,
I just went, yeah, yeah, no worries.
So I turned up and there's this huge queue literally
down to the tube station and I'm like, oh,
what are these people here for?
It's like, oh, they're all trying to get in.
So I go to the front gate and I said to the security guard,
oh, mate, could you tell John Ucombe that Gus Wallins here?
And he's like, yeah, mate, sure.
And I'm like, no, seriously, he goes, no, mate.
He said, no, that's not how it works.
I'm like, oh, I turn around, Roachie and Lendl are walking in.
And I'm like, I knew Roachie from the Nuka and Roach
tennis camps in Armidale.
I'm going for it.
So I said, Roachie, love that.
He turned around and he just looked straight.
He goes, Gus, what are you doing?
I said, oh, mate, Nuka said to come in.
He goes, come in with us.
So the security guard goes, well, okay.
So I'm not in and then 10 seconds later,
I'm walking in with Ivan Lendl and Tony Roach.
And Roachie and Nuka had done a gentleman's over 45 singles
the night before.
So Nuka was having a rub down and a bath and so forth.
Anyway, when I came in, he said to me,
oh, can you go through my post?
All my post is in my locker.
I'm going to go and get a massage and whatever.
Anyway, half an hour later, he'd forgotten that he started
running the bath and the bath overflowed and actually
dripped down into the BBC, which was below the men's locker room
and actually went through all their camera equipment and stuff.
So that was my introduction to Wimbledon.
And of course, a couple of days later, Pat
had actually won.
Well, he played Lendl in the final in 87.
Were you there for the final?
Well, what happened was I was working at this school
and they said to me that I could have one day off,
but it was a couple of days to the final after he won the semi.
But I got to which, sir, the semi.
But no, I watched it on, I think I was listening to it
on the radio playing cricket on the Sunday.
But you know, my history obviously with Nuka,
you know, with Wimbledon and so forth is immense.
When you made the final and then there was rain
and in the end of that being backpackers watching you days later,
what was that whole experience like for you obviously
with not getting the chockeys in the end?
Well, that was the second year.
The 2000 year I played Pete in the final
and it was a wet sort of time there as well.
Actually, we finished really dark,
but I choked really, really badly against Pete, unfortunately.
So that was my experience in 2000 when I had him.
And then with Goran, it was sort of just going tit for tat the whole time.
And it was just, I didn't really feel particularly any nerves
in that particular match, although I just thought I was going to win.
Obviously, the beginning part of it, you feel your nerves,
but you settle into it.
When it got to the end part of it,
I think Goran came up with some really big serves at the right time.
And, you know, I had him love 30 at five, four in the fifth set.
And I've just gone winner, winner on his returns.
He's gone second serve, second serve.
So again, and then love 30, he's missed his first serve again.
And I've read, I've predicted where he's second serves gone.
He's gone big the other way.
And I went, okay, impressive.
And the same thing again, he went a big second serve,
caught the line on a big point.
I went, geez, hats off to you, mate.
They'll end up nine, seven in the fifth.
At the end, there's actually a photo.
I'm cleaning up my room at the moment.
My wife found a photo of me and Goran together
at the shaking of hands at the end of the match.
You know, I'm looking happy and all sorts of things.
But it was a funny emotion, to be honest.
I knew it was going to be my last Wimbledon.
And I was really upset.
There's no doubt about it.
And people might say, you know, like, you know,
you should have reacted probably differently to that
because you should be so upset.
But there was two ways you go, isn't there?
You know, you sit there and you cry over, you know,
you spilled milk and you have a bit of a bitch and a whinge
and you handle it poorly, or you sort of put a smile on your face
and you accept the fact that it's all over
and you congratulate the guy for what he's just done.
And Goran and I are good mates.
So it made it so much different.
If it was someone I didn't really like,
then I probably wouldn't have reacted that way.
But it is, it's sort of a tricky one.
And it's funny, you talk to athletes,
and not just tennis players, but all athletes.
They think about the moments they've lost,
those big moments more than the ones they've won.
And they're the ones that stick with you a lot more,
which is so strange.
And it's so true.
Yeah, it's human nature.
You look at 100 comments, one's negative and 99 are brilliant.
And you just focus on that one negative one.
It's just really disappointing.
Yeah, well, I don't do social media for many reasons,
but I used to get letters back in the day.
And I remember I'd finished my career
and I got a letter from someone just totally abusing me.
And I was so pissed off, so annoyed at just the way
I got this letter and I ripped it all up.
You know, like I was so mad.
And then I actually went around and I went, you know what?
No, no, I sticky taped it all back together
and I've hung on to it.
So I thought, these are really great letters to have
because it's just not the general population.
And they see you very differently
and you should understand that it's not all about you
and how fabulous you think you are.
And those sort of things are really important.
Now I sort of take criticism for what it is.
You know, we all see people in their own different ways
and we can all judge them and we all do judge them,
unfortunately, it's part of human nature again.
Sometimes you keep it to yourself
and sometimes you express it.
So yeah, those type of things are sort of moments
where I'm just going, yeah, just sort of,
you know, just get with it a little bit.
Everyone's entitled to their opinion.
No, exactly right.
Pat, as you're going through your tennis career,
there's another whole life there for you,
you know, especially after tennis too.
You know, getting married, family, children
and that sort of stuff.
Are you open to talk about the first time you met
your now wife and how you feel about all that?
No, I'm not telling you a thing.
So we got set up on a blind date in 97
and it was after I won the first US Open
and I was going down to Sydney,
there was a few functions and things happening.
In fact, Nuke and Roachie got to meet my wife
in the first few days as well.
I was playing the Starlight Foundation,
the charity there with Nuke and that.
Did you care what they thought about her?
Did you look at those like father figures like,
oh, I'd like you to like her?
It was fresh though.
We didn't really know each other that well
in terms of my wife and I.
So as a girlfriend, it was just a very early day.
So set up on a blind date, we sort of hit it off
and then the next couple of years,
we sort of went through the motions of how,
you know, the relationship and all sorts of things.
And then it sort of went, you know,
let's get serious about this.
And then we spent the next two and a half years,
two years traveling around together and playing
and very cool chick and really enjoyed it.
And then after four years, I knew I was retiring.
And before I retired, I said, you know,
would you like to have a family?
Because she's always talked about it.
And she said, yeah, you know,
and then we decided that we were going to go
and I didn't think it would happen straight away,
And then the next thing you know, I'm having a child,
you know, straight after I retired,
which was actually excellent.
It was really cool.
And it couldn't have been better, I don't think,
because as an athlete, when you retire,
well, the retirement was on my own terms,
which is a lot better than being forced in a retirement
where a lot of people struggle
with what their transition is and who they are
and who their identity is more importantly.
I'd never had much problem making that change anyway,
because I knew there's more to life than playing tennis
and hitting the yellow ball over the net.
I could not work out, you know,
just, you know, this whole self involvement of it all
sometimes, you know, of the importance of self-importance
of playing tennis and winning and the be all and end all
and nothing else is happening in the world
except my existence right here, right now,
and my selfishness.
So I was able to put that in that perspective
and then go out and wanted a family,
wanted to see what life's all about
and to experience life for what it actually really is.
And it's certainly not tennis,
but tennis is a big part of my life.
So yeah, I was, the transition for me was really easy.
So we had a family straight away.
Great. So you loved up, you've got the barber.
What were you like as a dad first up?
Did you have that connection with your first child?
Yeah, I think so.
Sometimes my wife said I had too much of a connection
because she was saying, you know,
he wants to go to you all the time.
So yeah, because I'm a better bloke, I'm sorry.
So we had this lot.
My son didn't want to have a bar with me the first six weeks
and I'm just sitting there going, oh, we took so long.
We weren't as lucky as you guys.
We had some loss on the journey.
And then Vicks goes, why don't you just take him for bath time?
Why don't you just, when you get home from work,
why don't you just take him upstairs
and have half an hour in the shower with you
or on your tummy in the bath
and then towel him down, cream him up,
get his, you know, everything ready for bedtime
and then bring him down to me.
And that can be your time.
And it was genius from her
because A, I felt like a dad for the first time.
And then secondly, I felt that we bonded really well
and it gave her also, you know, a little half an hour off
from, you know, as we know how big a deal being a parent is.
You need a little half an hour's off every now and again.
Well, Gus, you're also working as well.
So your involvement was a way.
I was there the whole time.
You could not leave, you know,
so I'm a big part of both my children's lives
at an early time.
And I was just having, again,
having a discussion with my daughter just the other night.
You know, she's just finished school
and we're just talking about life
and then we're just talking about, she goes,
you know, I've never seen you work, Dad, you know.
And I said, yeah, that's so true.
Obviously, I know you do.
I don't sit down.
I don't talk about tennis unless she asks questions.
I don't show her any videos.
She doesn't know what I used to do.
Well, she does, but without all the detail.
And she goes, yeah, but on the flip side of it,
you might've been one of those parents
that worked the whole time and I never get to see you.
And I said, yeah, I don't know
what right or wrong answer is of being a parent,
except I was around a lot, especially when you needed me.
So, yeah, so that was, I was so, so lucky,
Gus, to have that involvement with my kids.
So you got the pigeon pair, got the boy and the girl.
What does Pat Rafter do now?
What is your life now, Pat?
Train every day, enjoy my fitness.
I have a group of guys up here we train with.
We do a lot of fun games.
I'll explain to you another time.
But fitness is really important for me.
And I'm on 70 acres here at the back of Byron Bay.
And we've done a big regeneration
of seven and a half thousand koala trees
and another seven and a half thousand rainforest trees so far.
That's just, so we've done more than that actually.
We've done 17,000 trees so far.
So a lot of it's about maintaining that, helping that out.
And then I got a lot of mowing to do
and a lot of maintenance to do.
I've got the machinery and I just burn around.
Animals you need to get rid of and things like that.
You've got to keep a real close eye on that.
And you're watching the kidneys go around,
the bandicoots run around and you're protecting them
and all sorts of things.
It's actually a fantastic life.
And I've just got this great balance.
And every now and then I go and do a little bit of work.
But generally all my work's on the property.
That sounds absolutely perfect.
What a beautiful balance for you to have.
What about tennis for you moving forward?
Do you play anymore?
When you say do a little bit of work,
is it around tennis, commentating and so forth?
So I haven't done any commentary.
I did once a long time ago, but that's not what I do.
In terms of playing, I don't play.
We have a court at home.
I try not to use it.
My wife used a ball machine yesterday.
Why is it that you don't play?
Not on my enjoyment list of things to do.
I play a game called Paddle Tennis,
which is a European game.
So it's a cross between squash and tennis.
So there's another game called Pickleball,
which is becoming familiar.
I don't like that sport at all.
But the Paddle Tennis is really complicated
and has a lot of layers to it, which are really cool.
Yeah, the Spanish and Europeans are very, very good at it.
And I'm learning, I'm getting okay.
And I really enjoy playing that.
So tennis, I will go down and do a bit of work
for some of my sponsors during the Aussie Open.
I have a couple of ones hanging around.
And then I'll also do some corporate stuff
while I'm down there, mainly talks and chats
and stories and things like that.
Well, I've loved listening to you, mate.
And I'd love at some stage to have a wander
through your property with a beer in hand
and talk some more.
Let's get to the Fast Five,
which are the last final five questions of our podcast.
Have you got a favourite quote?
Yeah, I do, actually.
It has changed over the times, I must admit.
So the first supposed to be Fast Five, sorry.
So the one I hung on to when I was playing
and I've still got this little thing.
It says history will be kind to me for I intend to write it,
which was Winston Churchill.
And it was so relevant for me.
And I've hung on to this thing for 25 years.
And I've kept it in my wallet and it's so interesting.
I've hung on to it.
It's changed now though, my quote.
And it's the one is hard times create strong men,
strong men create good times, good times create weak men,
weak men create weak times.
And that was from an author, Michael Hoff,
but that's sort of under the scrutiny as well
about who actually put that quote out there.
I just think it's so relevant in the world we live in.
I think as you get older, you sort of think about that.
And I might've said that too quickly.
I don't know if you want me to repeat that, but.
Yeah, please, please repeat it.
So hard times create strong men,
strong men create good times,
good times create weak men,
and weak men create weak times.
And it's been a cycle, I think, of humanity throughout the years.
So I think that's really relevant.
I really liked that quote.
No, me too, mate.
Slow five, slow five, come on.
Hey, you know what?
We call it the fast five.
We shouldn't call it the fast five
because we end up talking for at least 15 minutes over these
because people do, you know, quotes like that,
they're interesting and they need an explanation
and you don't want to rush through it.
So don't feel any pressure timewise.
Favourite holiday destination?
Either Bermuda or the Maldives.
Are you a reader?
Are you an audio book or do you actually like to get?
But back in the time, there was a book that I loved at the time
and it's stuck in my mind forever.
It's called Shadows of the Wind.
It was based in Barcelona.
I can't remember, Ruiz Zafon or something like that.
But that book stuck with me for a long time,
a book that I really enjoyed reading.
What was it about, roughly?
It's about a boy's journey, finding himself
and it was about, you know, he discovered a book in the old archives.
I think he was either worked, it was a long time ago now,
either worked in a bookstore or his father might have been involved
with a bookstore and he loved reading.
And this book, how it changed him and shaped his life
and the story that went along with it.
It was a fictitious book, but it was brilliantly written.
Great. And the fact that it's stuck in your mind
means how important it was to you.
Centre for Women.
And favourite charity.
We're very lucky here at Shore and Partners
who support this podcast and support me
and Gotcha for Life, my foundation.
So, well, they're giving every guest, Pat, $10,000
to give to a charity of their choice.
And also, if you can tell us what they will do with the $10,000.
So, there's a very special, very impressive lady who lives in Sydney.
She's a New Zealand girl who's half Australian, half Kiwi.
Her name's Audet XL and she ran this company called ISIS, unfortunately.
Which changed to Adara, obviously, because it had to.
She's just an amazing woman who, incredible businesswoman,
actually worked in Bermuda and that's where I met her for the first time.
She ran the Bermuda Stock Exchange and she's on the board of Westpac now.
And so she works to fund this charity effectively.
And all the money she makes is so she can just live
and give all her money and proceeds to her charities,
ones in Uganda and ones in Nepal.
And they help in Uganda.
They help women who have been having childbirth
and who have been ostracized from the township
or they've been kicked out because of whatever the husband's done to them
and treated them very poorly.
And she goes to these remote towns like that.
And then I went to Nepal and took my children there to see this charity as well.
And they went to a little town called Gangfetti
in the hills of outside Kathmandu for like a four or five hour drive.
And to the hills and the mountains and we experienced the township
and what they did for the children who are pretty well sexed off and slaved off
and how they try to protect these children.
And they give them a school, they've built a school there
which some of the charity money we gave in the past, you know, we went to see the school.
These kids walk two and a half hours so they can get a free meal
and because they put on food for these kids one meal a day.
So that's why they come two and a half hours each way.
One night this storm came through which was brutal
and we're in the hills and we're in a tin shed,
sort of in there having a chat and just thinking about these six year old kids,
eight year old kids walking through the mountains in the pitch black
while the storm was happening, just pelting down with rain and just going,
my God, you know, this world is crazy.
And what she does with them and the families support.
And then, and also again, same type of thing with women who have been kicked out
who have no family, no life, they supply housing,
they do jobs for them.
So that's where I'd like to see the money go to Audet or I've given money to her in the past
and a lot of other of my friends have too and she's a very, very special woman.
Yeah, she sounds it and we'll make sure that 10,000 goes to her
and she knows it's come from you as well.
We'll send her a link to this chat so she can hear what you just said about it.
But hey, Pat, it's been an absolute pleasure, nearly an hour has gone by so quickly.
So thank you so much for your time, mate, and lots of love to your family.
And perhaps I might see you at the Aussie Open.
I'm hoping to get down there with Clint for a couple of days so we could have some fun.
Yeah, likewise, Gus.
And let's have a beer, mate, if you're down at the Aussie Open and with Clint,
haven't seen Clint in a long time either.
So good on you, mate. Love the chat.
That was awesome.
Well, that's our chat with Pat Rafter.
I'm sure you enjoyed it as much as I had the chance to talk to him.
The Odara Group is where his $10,000 is going.
A wonderful cause.
Next week, another fantastic chat.
Hope you're enjoying this series.
Look forward to seeing you then.