It does take a great hunger to be successful at anything.

When your four biggest tournaments all operate relatively independently, and the ATP and WTA tour operate independently, and you have Davis Cup and Fed Cup that operate independently, it makes it a tough message.

There are only four U.S. tournaments that the very best players in the world play every year - Palm Springs, Miami, Cincinnati, and the U.S. Open. So how would golf or NFL or NHL fare if there were only four times a year that their very best were visible? Tennis went international, and for us to expect it to be popular media-wise is very naïve. And that translates into children and families being interested.

When I turned professional, what I was really aiming for was to be in the top 100, try to hold the top 100 for ten years, and just be in the show, and have a nice career. It's more than I could have ever hoped for. I worked awfully hard for it, but there are other people who worked just as hard and didn't get the breaks. I recognized that I've been lucky and being able to live this life that I wanted since a young age. I really went after it with everything that I have and somehow it worked out.

You need to look to make a cohesive calendar that makes sense and helps elongate the careers of your players as opposed to shorten them inadvertently.

I think all of us are shaped by the choices we make.

There is a lot of pressure on tennis players like other sports that are singular like you're not on a team. When all the pressure rides on your shoulders, it can be a lot different. Team sports you share those moments with the teammates. You share the pressures. You share the wins. You share the losses. You have a coach that can change the course of matches. But in tennis you're out there by yourself. There are no caddies. There are no coaches. You do it alone in the arena and I think that ups the ante a little bit.