Sebastian Korda made a good start in Paris beating compatriot Mackenzie McDonald in the first round and it's his first win since coming back from injury.
Korda injured himself at the Australian Open at a time when he was playing really strong tennis. After taking out Medvedev in Melbourne, Korda ran into injury issues and had to retire from his following match. The American then missed a couple of big events including Indian Wells, Miami and Monte Carlo but he made a return recently.
His first match back wasn't good and was a losing effort but he's now back in the winner's circle with a solid performance against McDonald. Despite not playing tennis, Korda worked on many things, mainly his body which he developed under the tutelage of noted trainer Jez Green.
Yeah, a lot's gone on, a new addition to my team, bringing Jez Green, put a lot of weight on, muscle. I put like 7 kilos of muscle on. Kind of getting back into it. Been a while since I played any tennis, really. Madrid, Rome, and now here, just kind of getting my feet comfortable again. Just one step at a time.
Like most young players, Korda doesn't really have issues with his tennis as it was always solid but the body is something you need to develop. Most of this young guys haven't really worked on their body as much with Alcaraz a noted exception.
The work he did with Green was fundamental and will do wonders for him as the season moves on. It's something Korda himself underlined because the injuries were starting to get more frequent. It was time to change things.
I think that was one of the things I needed most was to kind of get the body right. The tennis I always had. It was just kind of getting the body right and getting ready for these long best-of-five matches to make deep run.