Victoria Azarenka treasures 'invisible moments' after making Indian Wells semi-finals against Jelena Ostapenko
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Published 14/10/2021 at 09:59 GMT
“The results are coming. That's the measure, right? How else are you going to measure your progress?" Former world No 1 Victoria Azarenka will face Jelena Ostapenko for a place in the final of the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells. Azarenka will be bidding to reach her first final of 2021 and has spoken about her form and how she takes pride from her work off the court.
Victoria Azarenka
Image credit: Getty Images
Victoria Azarenka says she is savouring the “invisible moments” after beating Jessica Pegula to reach the semi-finals of the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells for the fourth time.
The former world No 1, who won Indian Wells in 2012 and 2016, needed just 94 minutes to beat Pegula and set up a meeting with Jelena Ostapenko.
Azarenka will be aiming to reach her first final of the year and says she is pleased with her improving form.
“The results are coming,” she said. “That's the measure, right? How else are you going to measure your progress?
“In tennis unfortunately it's all by the results, especially that measure from the outside. For yourself, you can put little goals and try to kind of climb that ladder. At the end of the day your results are going to determine how well you performed, which sometimes can be tricky.”
With her win over Pegula, Azarenka is now joint-third on the all-time list for most match victories at Indian Wells alongside Caroline Wozniacki. Only two women, Lindsay Davenport (47) and Maria Sharapova (38), have more than Azarenka’s 32 wins.
“I'm not the type of person who likes to really step back and look back because I still feel like I'm in my journey,” she added.
“I don't necessarily reassess, kind of take from my old experiences: ‘Oh, that's how it felt.’ I don't necessarily think you remember the whole picture. It's more about certain selective memories that you pick out.
“The best moments are invisible moments I will say, the ones that nobody sees and you overcome. I will say that those couple moments in my life happened where I was super proud of myself which had nothing to do with tennis results.”
Ostapenko reached her first WTA 1000 semi-final in three years with a 6-4 4-6 6-3 win over Shelby Rogers.
The 2017 French Open champion has done plenty of travelling in the last few weeks as she played in Cincinnati, before heading back to Europe as she missed the US Open for medical reasons, and then coming back to the USA.
"It's really great because especially after I couldn't play US Open, I was really sad about it because I was in such a great form before," she said.
"I think it's another great opportunity because it's a big tournament. I just enjoy it. It's the last couple of tournaments this season. I'm just going to try to enjoy it as much as possible.
"I honestly feel like I can continue the season much longer, but there are not many tournaments left. Most of the players are very tired, but I don't feel like that. I'm kind of feeling very fresh."
The two remaining quarter-finals take place on Thursday as Ons Jabeur faces Anett Kontaveit and Paula Badosa takes on Angelique Kerber.
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