Bruno Soares is seeing double…
The 33-year-old Brazilian tennis player made history at this year’s Australian Open by winning two doubles championship matches.
On Sunday afternoon, Soares added the mixed doubles title with Elena Vesnina to the men’s doubles championship he won with Jamie Murray.
Vesnina and Soares won the final four points of the match tiebreaker to take the mixed doubles title with a 6-4, 4-6, 10-5 win over American Coco Vandeweghe and Horia Tecau of Romania.
A little more than 16 hours earlier — after 1 a.m. Sunday — Soares and Murray defeated Daniel Nestor and Radek Stepanek 2-6, 6-4, 7-5, also at Rod Laver Arena.
A Brazilian player had never won any title at the Australian Open. Now the country has two.
Soares said he didn’t finish media commitments at Melbourne Park until 2 a.m. Sunday then had to do some Brazilian press requests from his hotel room.
“I went to bed at 5, set my alarm for 11, woke up at 8:30 … been living on coffee ever since,” Soares said. “So I had 22 coffees already.”
Vesnina interjected, laughing: “I got a [text] message from him at 4:30 [a.m.], ‘I’m ready, partner.'”
It was all worth it, Soares said.
“I knew I had another important day today. You don’t get a chance to play many Grand Slam finals,” he said. “I mean, I got two in the same day.”
Soares said the level of excitement in Brazil over his achievements was high.
“It’s the first time a Brazilian guy competes in two Grand Slam finals in the same event,” he said. “They were talking a lot about that. And winning both makes it even more special.
“It’s tough to compare or relate anything to Guga [the nickname for Gustavo Kuerten, who won three French Open singles titles]. He’s such a hero for us. He’s so above the sport and everything else. But for me it’s a massive achievement. It doesn’t get much better than that. I came here to play two events, and I won both.”
Soares said he hopes his win will give tennis a boost in his home country ahead of the Olympics in August. He visited the tennis complex in Rio in December and gave it the thumbs-up.
“You guys hear a lot of things about Brazil … not all the time that good,” he said. “We’re famous for hosting well, for welcoming. We’re a very warm country. I hope it’s going to be an amazing Games.”
