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A NETFLIX ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARY

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Official YIFY movies site:
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DURING HIS TRIPS
BETWEEN MAY 1973 AND LATE 1979,

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GUILLERMO VILAS RECORDED 46 CASSETTE TAPES
THAT WERE NEVER HEARD

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UNTIL NOW

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VILAS - VOICE - EARLY DAYS

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My life has been a great discovery.
I've always tried to figure it all out.

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The first time I saw fire, I got burned.

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I thought it was wonderful,
it was warm. It felt good.

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I thought, "What if I touch it?
I'm sure I'll feel warm inside."

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That's how I discovered the world,
and how I got where I am today.

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Who is Guillermo Vilas,

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the man who changed the tennis world
this afternoon?

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NUMBER ONE FOR 12 WEEKS

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I always enjoyed it afterward.

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You can't be truly happy,
but you can do something

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that makes you happy
every time you remember it.

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NUMBER ONE FOR 310 WEEKS (ACTIVE)

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He's one of the greatest
in the history of our sport,

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and being Argentinian, 
he had a huge impact

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in the Latin American tennis circuit.

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In fact,
I think that every Latin sportsman

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should thank him for that.

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NUMBER ONE FOR 209 WEEKS (ACTIVE)

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I think that his style and his mindset
had a great influence on me,

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as well as
on many other Argentine tennis players.

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NUMBER ONE FOR 20 WEEKS

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Winning is the consequence

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of every good thing
you did that year,

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of your work, of taking things seriously.

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Personally, self-improvement
is what means the most to me.

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Vilas was obsessed

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with being the number one
in every category he reached.

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JOURNALIST AND RESEARCHER

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First, he was number one
in Club Náutico Mar del Plata.

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Then he was number one
in the city of Mar del Plata,

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and then number one in his country.

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And he wanted to go for more
and become number one in the world.

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MY HEART AND MY CHAMPION

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NUMBER ONE FOR 109 WEEKS

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He has filed complaints
throughout his whole life.

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He did it in 1975, 1977, and 1982,

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the three years
when he had his best performance

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and was closer to rank number one.

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But he never had a positive answer
from the ATP authorities.

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I asked many times to see the records,

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but my request was always denied.

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MATHEMATICIAN AND PROGRAMMER

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PART TWO

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Besides the whole computer mess,
this is very simple:

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take all the players ranked number one
by the computer,

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and check how many titles
they won each year.

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They wouldn't add up to half the amount
of titles I won that year.

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I knew that wasn't right,

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that someone with the worst of intentions
used all in their power

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to try to make me believe

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I wasn't number one.

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It is said that it is irrational
to try and change the past.

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But can someone beat their own history?

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People think
history is written by its protagonists.

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No, history is written by time.
Time gives you everything.

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I'm sure that, eventually,

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someone will take charge,
tell it like it is

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and support my claim.

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The number one player has always been
the one who wins the most tournaments.

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YOU'LL BE WHATEVER YOU HAVE TO BE
OR YOU'LL BE NOTHING

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My name is Eduardo Puppo
and I'm a journalist.

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I published
my first tennis magazine in 1980,

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and I haven't done
anything else since then.

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I covered about 300 tournaments
in 20 countries,

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and more than 50 or 60
Grand Slam tournaments.

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I was the press officer
for all things tennis-related

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in Argentina.

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I'm the author of the tennis encyclopedia
Historia del tenis argentino.

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I worked for several radio stations,
and, since 2004,

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I have worked as an analyst
on the CNN en Español news show.

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In June 2007, I heard Vilas
had filed a new complaint before the ATP.

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I understood it was a 30-year-long,
unprecedented injustice.

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That idea kept running through my mind.

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Six months later,
some news changed the course of history,

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and made me turn my attention
to Vilas's complaint again.

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The Goolagong issue

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was a wake-up call
in the history of world tennis.

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They were admitting
to old flaws in the system

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and awarded the number one spot
to the Australian tennis player,

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thirty-one years after her achievement
in the women's tennis circuit.

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The news caused sort of a stir in me,

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it moved me to take on a mission.

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It encouraged me to walk down
a retrospective path into statistics,

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without foreseeing neither
the great impact the study would have

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nor the fact that it would consume
12 years of both my life and my family's.

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MUSEUM
PHOTOS - ALBUMS

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These are some of the diaries
and journals Guillermo wrote.

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During his career,

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he truly registered everything

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with a tremendous…

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level of detail.

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Eduardo started

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to take on this responsibility…

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as if he were…

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EDUARDO PUPPO'S WIFE

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…the one who had to show the tennis world

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what they owed to Guillermo Vilas.

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I saw Vilas for the first time in 1974,
in a match he played

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against Julián Ganzábal.

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It was the final of the Copa Ciudad
de Buenos Aires tournament.

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He was so different from the rest,

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he was this guy
with long hair and a headband.

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I don't know what shocked me the most,

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watching him play tennis
or seeing such a character.

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For tennis fans,
Guillermo Vilas needs no introduction.

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He's number one, two, three,
I don't even know anymore,

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but he is one of the big champions
of the tennis world.

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I started playing
when I was six years old,

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but I played against a wall at home
for the first three years.

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-Alone against a wall?
-Yes, I'd play against a wall in my house.

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And then I started playing.

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And you became a champion right away.

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-The champion of the wall.
-The best one in the class.

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The champion of the wall.

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My father always told me,

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"Passion will take you far in life,

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doing things half-heartedly
will hurt you."

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I embraced that passion
and I have always kept that attitude.

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Dad realized that my path

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as an athlete, playing in the streets,

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which was where you practiced sports
at the time, was very complicated.

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So he encouraged me to take up tennis.

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He took me to see
a tennis tournament in Villa Gesell.

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He told me such a tall tale.
"These guys play here, learn English,

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go to play in Europe and then come back."

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What a lie!
They were kids from Mar del Plata.

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But I loved it.

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The next day, Dad took me to buy a racket…

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and I started playing.

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"I started playing
when I was six years old,

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I used to play
in the garage of my house."

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"I'd play three hours every evening."

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"There was a lamp on the ceiling."

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"I'd break it every single day,
so my mom told me,

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'You'll get a new light bulb per day.'"

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"So I'd play until I broke it."

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"It would last me for two or three hours."

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Here they are.

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Okay.

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Here we have…

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his first racket,

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a Sarina, which was made by Sportlandia.

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This is the real one.

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This Dunlop Gold Wing…

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was his second racket.
It's a more professional one.

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And then he started using…

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the Blue Flash,
a racket more suitable for competitions.

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My research aimed at reconstructing

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the 280 weeks between August 1973,

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when the first official
ATP ranking was published,

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and December 1978.

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This period wasn't chosen randomly.

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It was when,
in my opinion as a journalist,

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Vilas had more chances
to have achieved the world number one.

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I contacted former tournament directors,
former ATP chairmen,

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the Roland-Garros, 
Wimbledon and USTA libraries,

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the Hall of Fame library in Newport,

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journalists that worked at that time,
news agencies, newspaper archives.

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I consulted
more than 100 reliable sources.

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I got the help of many relatives,
friends and colleagues

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who typed in thousands of match results,
because there were lots of them.

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There were between 
80 and 90 tournaments per season.

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Our records
reflected the real activity at the courts

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without any distortion.

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I was, and I've always been,
by Eduardo's side.

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I helped him with everything he asked me

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because I find research fascinating
and I'm quite obsessive.

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I'm satisfied with my collaboration

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because truth was at stake here.

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That's how Project V was born.

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I named it "V" after Vilas, of course,

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but also as a way of trying
to keep it confidential.

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My dad noticed
that most players who came

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to the Campeonato
del Sur de la República tournament

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had Locícero as their instructor

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and spoke very fondly of him.

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When I was eight and a half,
Locícero settled in Mar del Plata

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and founded a tennis school,
and we started playing there.

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My instructor told me:

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"Do you want to be a champion
or just play tennis?"

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"Do you want to be the best in your club
or in Argentina?"

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"So, what comes next?"

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"Winning tournaments,
and then Grand Slam tournaments."

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"Could I be the Argentine champion?"

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He said:
"Yes, you can, if you do as I say."

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A champion must have two main things…

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VOICE OF FELIPE LOCÍCERO
VILAS'S ONLY TENNIS INSTRUCTOR

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…talent and passion.

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They should learn
from a professional who's studied,

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who knows and understands,

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the three main areas
in professional tennis:

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physical training,
technique and serving skills.

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If you fail in any of these three areas,

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if you don't do your best,

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you won't become a great player.

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I asked my instructor,

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"How many tennis players
in the world are there on tour?"

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He replied,
"There are about 60 or 70 players."

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In the whole world! I then realized
I was playing a demanding sport.

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I'm telling you,
tennis is not hard to play.

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But if you don't understand it,
you can't improve.

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Take music, for example.
Once you understand it, it's not hard.

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C, D, E, F, A, B…

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And then you can play a tango,
a ranchera… any kind of music.

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You can even compose your own.

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It's the same with tennis.

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There are 4 forehand-related subjects
and 4 backhand-related subjects.

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After a year with him,
he said, "I won't charge you anymore."

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"But I want to come to class every day."

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"And you will, but I won't charge you."
And he never charged me again.

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Because he knew I'd be a tennis player.

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LOCÍCERO AND HIS STAR PLAYER: VILAS

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RENOWNED TENNIS PLAYERS
AT PRIMARY SCHOOL AGE

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VILAS: RISING STAR IN TENNIS
HE'S THE CLUB NÁUTICO'S PROMISE AT AGE 12

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A NATIONAL IDOL
AND AN EXAMPLE FOR THE YOUTH

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My mother was…

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She was always afraid
that I'd try to play professionally.

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TENNIS - YOUNG TALENT
WILL DEFINE THE AUTUMN SEASON

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"What if our son becomes a tennis player?"

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She said, "He won't,
he'll see there's no money in it."

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"He won't be able
to have the lifestyle we have now

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and he'll stop playing."

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My mother met up
with some important people, some lawyers,

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and they tried to convince me
I'd be really unhappy.

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I replied, "I'll be unhappy
if I do what you do for a living."

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The meeting was very short.

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I was already a champion in Argentina.

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-Already?
-In South America.

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VILAS GOES TO THE USA

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I was part of a team
of South American champions.

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When I was 15, I won the Orange Bowl.

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MIAMI, USA

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The Orange Bowl
is the starting point for most players.

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00:17:55,115 --> 00:17:57,451
Hardly ever does a good player
appear somewhere else.

242
00:18:03,540 --> 00:18:06,418
I started asking,
"Hey, who's the best player here?"

243
00:18:06,502 --> 00:18:08,212
"This one? That one?"
They said, "Connors."

244
00:18:09,213 --> 00:18:11,632
"Which one is Connors?"
"The one who's there with his mom."

245
00:18:13,092 --> 00:18:16,762
There he was. I watched him play,
he played with the Wilson T2000 racket.

246
00:18:17,429 --> 00:18:22,392
The Wilson T2000 racket
was created by Lacoste in 1940.

247
00:18:23,018 --> 00:18:25,604
Connors liked it
because he's not very strong.

248
00:18:25,687 --> 00:18:28,357
He's very weak… as a player.

249
00:18:28,440 --> 00:18:31,944
That racket was really powerful.
He was the only one who used it.

250
00:18:32,027 --> 00:18:35,489
I studied him for a week.
I watched him every time he trained.

251
00:18:37,616 --> 00:18:39,952
Then I had to play against him,
and I beat him.

252
00:18:40,035 --> 00:18:42,538
Truth be told,
I didn't have to do much because…

253
00:18:45,040 --> 00:18:46,166
Well, I played very well.

254
00:18:46,250 --> 00:18:48,544
I did what I had to do to win.

255
00:18:48,627 --> 00:18:51,588
He'd never watched me play
because he was better than me.

256
00:18:51,672 --> 00:18:54,466
That time, he lost 6-4, 7-5, I think.

257
00:18:55,050 --> 00:18:58,428
He shook my hand quite angrily
and looking away.

258
00:18:58,971 --> 00:19:01,014
And then he left, he disappeared.

259
00:19:01,098 --> 00:19:02,349
VILAS, ORANGE BOWL CHAMPION

260
00:19:02,432 --> 00:19:05,936
I was checking
who would be my future enemies.

261
00:19:06,019 --> 00:19:07,479
VILAS DOMINATES AT THE ORANGE BOWL

262
00:19:12,067 --> 00:19:15,445
Guillermo Vilas is back in Mar del Plata
since last night.

263
00:19:15,529 --> 00:19:17,156
CHANNEL 10 OF MAR DEL PLATA
JANUARY 1970

264
00:19:17,239 --> 00:19:19,950
And, of course,
he's already back at the Club Náutico,

265
00:19:20,033 --> 00:19:21,368
which is sort of his second home.

266
00:19:21,451 --> 00:19:24,454
Which was
your most important achievement so far,

267
00:19:24,538 --> 00:19:26,248
the most satisfying one?

268
00:19:26,331 --> 00:19:29,293
Well, having won
the Orange Bowl championship.

269
00:19:29,877 --> 00:19:31,420
Every year I've taken part,

270
00:19:31,503 --> 00:19:34,339
I've won the Orange Bowl,
both doubles and singles.

271
00:19:34,423 --> 00:19:37,968
And that's the most important championship
for a tennis player.

272
00:19:38,051 --> 00:19:39,261
Will you go to Punta del Este?

273
00:19:40,137 --> 00:19:43,599
I'll try to,
but I'm too tired from my last trip,

274
00:19:43,682 --> 00:19:46,226
I haven't had some rest since…

275
00:19:46,310 --> 00:19:48,395
I haven't had a rest day since July,

276
00:19:48,478 --> 00:19:50,772
I've been playing every day,
I traveled to Europe…

277
00:19:51,440 --> 00:19:54,318
It's quite tiring,
I should stop for a while

278
00:19:54,401 --> 00:19:57,112
because this year will be
even more intense than the previous one.

279
00:19:57,196 --> 00:19:59,990
I'll play the Davis Cup
and many other tournaments.

280
00:20:00,073 --> 00:20:03,285
-And you're studying too.
-Yes, this is my last year in high school,

281
00:20:03,368 --> 00:20:05,787
and I have to prepare
for the university admission exams.

282
00:20:20,594 --> 00:20:27,559
JOURNALIST, THE NEW YORK TIMES

283
00:20:33,857 --> 00:20:38,153
Vilas's 1977 tour was extraordinary.

284
00:20:38,237 --> 00:20:42,115
That's why nobody paid any attention
to his performance in other years.

285
00:20:43,283 --> 00:20:45,535
When analyzing 1975,

286
00:20:45,619 --> 00:20:50,624
I noticed that Jimmy Connors had been
number one by a very small margin,

287
00:20:50,707 --> 00:20:55,420
his average was a little more than 0.19
higher than Vilas's.

288
00:20:55,504 --> 00:20:56,380
AVERAGE

289
00:20:56,463 --> 00:21:02,761
Connors's average was 42.72
against Vilas's 42.52.

290
00:21:03,303 --> 00:21:04,429
This difference was…

291
00:21:05,138 --> 00:21:10,644
so small that it made me focus
only in Vilas's and Connors's points.

292
00:21:12,437 --> 00:21:19,403
JOURNALIST, THE TENNIS CHANNEL

293
00:21:27,369 --> 00:21:29,788
After many additions,
subtractions and divisions,

294
00:21:29,871 --> 00:21:33,417
I realized
that I was making a terrible mistake

295
00:21:33,500 --> 00:21:39,339
because taking only Vilas and Connors
into account, as I had planned,

296
00:21:39,423 --> 00:21:43,677
and making that isolated comparison,
was impracticable.

297
00:21:44,594 --> 00:21:50,183
I then understood I had to redo
the rankings from their very first day,

298
00:21:50,267 --> 00:21:54,730
from August 1973 and forward.

299
00:21:55,355 --> 00:21:56,773
Truth be told, I was…

300
00:21:57,649 --> 00:22:02,321
absolutely demoralized,
many of my calculations were of no use.

301
00:22:02,863 --> 00:22:06,158
I had to start from scratch in many areas.

302
00:22:07,284 --> 00:22:09,911
Our house
was practically no longer a home.

303
00:22:09,995 --> 00:22:13,123
It was full of papers,
books, and magazines.

304
00:22:13,206 --> 00:22:17,336
It turned literally
into a warehouse full of evidence

305
00:22:17,419 --> 00:22:20,630
that forced us, for instance,
not to have people over

306
00:22:20,714 --> 00:22:21,757
due to lack of space.

307
00:22:26,553 --> 00:22:32,351
This is the place where I spent
hundreds of hours, day and night.

308
00:22:33,560 --> 00:22:35,103
I would go to sleep

309
00:22:35,187 --> 00:22:39,733
and sometimes wake up and write stuff down
in a notebook, still in bed,

310
00:22:39,816 --> 00:22:44,404
and then I'd come back here
to try and give shape to those ideas.

311
00:22:45,530 --> 00:22:47,991
Sometimes my children would come down,
I'd see them,

312
00:22:48,075 --> 00:22:50,827
and they would tell me,
"Why are you still up so late?"

313
00:22:50,911 --> 00:22:51,787
So there's that.

314
00:22:51,870 --> 00:22:55,832
Eduardo put Vilas's ATP ranking
at the top of his priorities.

315
00:22:56,416 --> 00:22:59,544
I fought a lot with him and with myself.

316
00:23:00,253 --> 00:23:02,297
It was very hard, because I felt…

317
00:23:04,966 --> 00:23:06,510
that the most precious things to me,

318
00:23:06,593 --> 00:23:09,388
my marriage and my family,
were in jeopardy.

319
00:23:09,471 --> 00:23:12,224
EDU, YOU'RE THE NUMBER ONE

320
00:23:12,307 --> 00:23:14,684
I kept doing every possible calculation,

321
00:23:14,768 --> 00:23:17,562
doing as much as I could
with my math knowledge,

322
00:23:17,646 --> 00:23:21,483
until one day I just…
I got sick and tired of it all.

323
00:23:21,566 --> 00:23:25,487
I tore everything into pieces
and that was it.

324
00:23:25,570 --> 00:23:27,531
All that work…

325
00:23:28,323 --> 00:23:33,161
So many hours and sheets of paper
that were of absolutely no use.

326
00:23:52,055 --> 00:23:54,433
"You'll be whatever you have to be
or you'll be nothing."

327
00:24:00,522 --> 00:24:03,442
That kind of thought
was very popular at that time.

328
00:24:03,525 --> 00:24:06,528
According to those new values,
the world was wrong. And it was.

329
00:24:12,951 --> 00:24:17,080
After the end of the war,
we were dancing to Glenn Miller.

330
00:24:17,789 --> 00:24:19,666
Then Elvis came up,

331
00:24:20,500 --> 00:24:22,669
with a completely different music.

332
00:24:23,378 --> 00:24:25,714
And I had my own Elvis, Flaco Spinetta.

333
00:24:25,797 --> 00:24:28,675
I went to one of his concerts.
There were many people waiting,

334
00:24:28,758 --> 00:24:29,801
everyone had long hair.

335
00:24:29,885 --> 00:24:33,346
Flaco Spinetta went on stage, followed by
David Lebón, dressed in women's clothes.

336
00:24:33,430 --> 00:24:38,101
Just that, by Mar del Plata standards,
was something astonishing.

337
00:24:42,564 --> 00:24:44,191
That concert blew my mind.

338
00:24:46,693 --> 00:24:50,280
The hippie movement emerged,

339
00:24:50,363 --> 00:24:54,826
and I liked its ideology
of liberation, of letting yourself loose…

340
00:24:56,661 --> 00:25:00,707
of seeing that life
is not just about studying and working,

341
00:25:00,790 --> 00:25:02,417
and doing everything fathers did.

342
00:25:02,501 --> 00:25:04,252
It was against getting chained 
to all that.

343
00:25:04,336 --> 00:25:06,671
It was all about following your passion.

344
00:25:06,755 --> 00:25:09,966
And, sometimes,
passions give you lots of freedom

345
00:25:10,759 --> 00:25:11,801
and little money.

346
00:25:13,970 --> 00:25:15,722
I remember when Woodstock took place.

347
00:25:16,848 --> 00:25:19,351
At that moment, the world changed.

348
00:25:19,935 --> 00:25:24,105
My passions grew even stronger
because I saw that was the only choice.

349
00:25:26,983 --> 00:25:28,443
DAVIS: KOCH AND VILAS
THE FIRST MATCH

350
00:25:31,780 --> 00:25:33,657
I went to Houston to play.

351
00:25:33,740 --> 00:25:37,369
I entered a record store and asked,
"Man, I come from Argentina."

352
00:25:37,452 --> 00:25:39,412
"Which progressive music records
do you have?"

353
00:25:39,496 --> 00:25:41,831
"Here," he said.

354
00:25:43,625 --> 00:25:44,960
It was Hendrix.

355
00:25:45,794 --> 00:25:49,130
I listened to Hendrix
from Houston to Miami,

356
00:25:49,214 --> 00:25:50,799
and then to Buenos Aires, nonstop.

357
00:25:51,716 --> 00:25:53,885
I was completely blown away.

358
00:25:56,680 --> 00:25:59,474
GRADUATION IN PARIS
VILAS HAD AN EXCEPTIONAL PERFORMANCE

359
00:26:01,101 --> 00:26:03,186
In Argentina, sport fans

360
00:26:03,270 --> 00:26:07,190
are becoming familiar with terms
that, until now, were almost unheard:

361
00:26:07,274 --> 00:26:10,402
passing shot, drive, backhand,
Grand Slam, topspin,

362
00:26:10,485 --> 00:26:15,240
all thanks to our rising star
in the tennis world, Guillermo Vilas.

363
00:26:15,907 --> 00:26:17,701
ARGENTINE OPEN

364
00:26:17,784 --> 00:26:22,414
We're witnessing the amazing arrival
of the new icon in world tennis.

365
00:26:22,497 --> 00:26:23,873
How high will he go?

366
00:26:23,957 --> 00:26:26,710
Will he play the next Masters
in Melbourne?

367
00:26:26,793 --> 00:26:29,671
Vilas is popularizing tennis
across Argentina.

368
00:26:41,099 --> 00:26:44,269
Guillermo has evolved as I expected.

369
00:26:44,352 --> 00:26:46,396
When we arrived in Melbourne, he showed

370
00:26:46,479 --> 00:26:49,316
he had recovered from the exhaustion
he'd been feeling in Buenos Aires.

371
00:26:49,399 --> 00:26:51,359
VOICE OF JUAN CARLOS BELFONTE
TRAINER AND ADVISER

372
00:27:03,496 --> 00:27:07,000
My coach set up a weird training session,
which I had never done before.

373
00:27:09,294 --> 00:27:11,588
I'd wake up at 4:00 a.m.

374
00:27:11,671 --> 00:27:14,049
and he'd make me exercise on an incline.

375
00:27:14,132 --> 00:27:19,763
He included other unique exercises,
he prepared a mixed routine for me.

376
00:27:19,846 --> 00:27:24,267
To be honest, it was quite bizarre,
but I was at my best.

377
00:27:27,062 --> 00:27:29,648
Năstase ruled at the Masters Cup,

378
00:27:29,731 --> 00:27:34,027
but I was applying the techniques
my trainer had taught me.

379
00:27:34,110 --> 00:27:35,278
I was on automatic mode.

380
00:27:47,457 --> 00:27:48,333
And I grew tired.

381
00:27:52,921 --> 00:27:58,468
At some point, I started to apply
the techniques a bit more anarchically.

382
00:28:05,266 --> 00:28:07,477
I made all the right decisions.

383
00:28:20,949 --> 00:28:26,329
Guillermo Vilas has won the 1974 Masters.

384
00:28:26,413 --> 00:28:29,416
He defeated Romanian Ilie Năstase,

385
00:28:29,499 --> 00:28:33,128
who has been the winner of the tournament
for the last three years.

386
00:28:53,356 --> 00:28:56,609
The most difficult part
was rationalizing what happened.

387
00:28:56,693 --> 00:28:57,902
It took me three years.

388
00:28:58,820 --> 00:29:04,200
Everything in life has its own system,
mechanics and repetitions.

389
00:29:04,284 --> 00:29:07,245
Sometimes those repetitions are so apart

390
00:29:07,328 --> 00:29:08,997
that it's hard to find a pattern.

391
00:29:09,789 --> 00:29:13,334
Until I found it. When I did,
the result was that extraordinary 1977.

392
00:29:13,418 --> 00:29:15,044
I spent three years studying.

393
00:29:20,216 --> 00:29:22,969
I was totally devastated,

394
00:29:23,052 --> 00:29:27,432
so my patient wife embarked on a crusade

395
00:29:27,515 --> 00:29:30,560
to find a brilliant mathematician,

396
00:29:30,643 --> 00:29:34,189
who was also knowledgeable
in the history of tennis.

397
00:29:37,609 --> 00:29:42,113
I started wondering where I could find
people who were absolutely nuts

398
00:29:42,197 --> 00:29:45,575
and obsessed with such a specific topic
as it is the ATP ranking.

399
00:29:45,658 --> 00:29:47,410
Even more specifically,
the old ATP ranking,

400
00:29:47,494 --> 00:29:50,622
a ranking that got lost in time.

401
00:29:51,372 --> 00:29:56,211
I thought, "Okay, if Eduardo already
looked for books, newspaper archives,

402
00:29:56,294 --> 00:29:58,046
tournament directors,
what do we have left?"

403
00:29:58,129 --> 00:29:59,005
"Fans, of course."

404
00:29:59,088 --> 00:30:00,131
CAREFUL

405
00:30:00,215 --> 00:30:02,550
AVERAGE - MONDAY
HE HAD 886

406
00:30:02,634 --> 00:30:06,471
I started searching for people talking

407
00:30:06,554 --> 00:30:09,766
about the ATP ranking
on international blogs.

408
00:30:10,683 --> 00:30:15,271
I felt that those people were special,
they were really obsessed,

409
00:30:15,355 --> 00:30:17,816
because nobody pays you
to write on a blog.

410
00:30:18,733 --> 00:30:22,737
At some point, I entered a forum
and I found a Slovak man.

411
00:30:22,821 --> 00:30:24,364
I asked him some questions,

412
00:30:24,447 --> 00:30:29,327
and I told Eduardo, "Look,
I found a guy who's quite similar to you."

413
00:30:31,538 --> 00:30:35,500
She found a Slovak man
who didn't take on the challenge,

414
00:30:35,583 --> 00:30:39,796
but he recommended another man,
a Romanian named Marian Ciulpan.

415
00:31:04,362 --> 00:31:09,617
An Argentinian was about to work
with a Romanian to study Vilas's ranking.

416
00:31:09,701 --> 00:31:13,496
And Vilas, an Argentinian,
had achieved his victories

417
00:31:13,580 --> 00:31:17,250
thanks to Felipe Locícero, of course,
but also to a Romanian, Ion Ţiriac.

418
00:31:40,064 --> 00:31:42,775
I sent him different sets of data,

419
00:31:42,859 --> 00:31:45,194
different tournament results.

420
00:31:45,278 --> 00:31:48,489
If we consider the huge amount
of information to analyze…

421
00:31:49,574 --> 00:31:51,367
it was quite an ambitious goal.

422
00:32:46,673 --> 00:32:47,882
Does anyone know?

423
00:32:49,884 --> 00:32:52,637
Borg, Panatta,
please go to the main court.

424
00:32:52,720 --> 00:32:54,681
-Borg, Panatta.
-Not Panatta, Vilas!

425
00:32:56,057 --> 00:32:57,934
Borg, Vilas, please go to the main court.

426
00:32:58,017 --> 00:32:58,935
Thanks.

427
00:32:59,018 --> 00:33:01,437
Guillermo Vilas, Argentina.

428
00:33:18,621 --> 00:33:20,915
I was really nervous at that tournament

429
00:33:21,624 --> 00:33:23,334
because I had beaten him
the previous time,

430
00:33:23,418 --> 00:33:25,128
because I had won the Masters Cup…

431
00:33:27,130 --> 00:33:29,507
because I knew
I had a good chance of beating him,

432
00:33:29,590 --> 00:33:33,344
and, as I said before, because
I was just a player, not a great player.

433
00:34:01,664 --> 00:34:03,750
APARTMENT NUMBER 46
OCTOBER 28TH

434
00:34:03,833 --> 00:34:07,462
I was close friends with Borg.
We traveled together all the time.

435
00:34:07,545 --> 00:34:11,966
One day, I met him
before entering the hotel and he said,

436
00:34:12,050 --> 00:34:14,093
"May I ask you something?"

437
00:34:14,886 --> 00:34:18,890
"Your forehand stinks,

438
00:34:19,515 --> 00:34:22,560
and my backhand is quite shitty."

439
00:34:22,643 --> 00:34:24,645
So, we exchanged techniques.

440
00:34:51,047 --> 00:34:53,091
We played together.
I played doubles with Borg.

441
00:34:53,174 --> 00:34:55,927
I made bets with Borg,

442
00:34:56,552 --> 00:34:59,597
we bet on who would make
a rival drop their racket,

443
00:34:59,680 --> 00:35:02,642
which one of us
would make them drop more rackets.

444
00:35:02,725 --> 00:35:05,103
And we would aim at their chests

445
00:35:05,186 --> 00:35:08,231
because, back then, no one was
familiarized with the concept of topspin.

446
00:36:10,084 --> 00:36:12,378
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

447
00:36:36,527 --> 00:36:39,614
With Ciulpan,
calculations became much more agile.

448
00:36:39,697 --> 00:36:45,745
Between August 1973 and December 1978,

449
00:36:45,828 --> 00:36:47,997
according to the ATP database,

450
00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:52,376
128 official rankings were published,

451
00:36:52,460 --> 00:36:56,214
out of the 280 possible ones, given
the amount of weeks in that interval.

452
00:36:56,297 --> 00:36:59,508
So, following that official criterion,

453
00:36:59,592 --> 00:37:04,263
the other 152 weeks
shouldn't be granted to anyone.

454
00:37:04,347 --> 00:37:05,806
But that's not what happened.

455
00:37:08,726 --> 00:37:11,979
In 1975,
the 13 weeks with published rankings

456
00:37:12,063 --> 00:37:14,357
were granted to Jimmy Connors…

457
00:37:16,317 --> 00:37:19,654
and so were the 39 weeks
with no published rankings.

458
00:37:21,113 --> 00:37:24,200
They granted him the full year, 52 weeks,

459
00:37:24,283 --> 00:37:27,995
without having properly calculated
or confirmed any of them.

460
00:38:30,558 --> 00:38:31,892
CHAMPION

461
00:38:31,976 --> 00:38:35,813
Vilas knew
he had played very well in 1975.

462
00:38:35,896 --> 00:38:37,231
CHAMPION

463
00:38:37,315 --> 00:38:38,399
CHAMPION

464
00:38:38,482 --> 00:38:44,030
After Wimbledon,
he won more than 30 matches in a row.

465
00:38:44,113 --> 00:38:48,117
He felt he was very close
to Connors's average.

466
00:38:50,036 --> 00:38:51,746
SEMIFINALS

467
00:38:51,829 --> 00:38:54,498
For Vilas's averages,

468
00:38:54,582 --> 00:38:58,461
his consistent performance
during several periods of that season

469
00:38:58,544 --> 00:39:00,755
was crucial.

470
00:39:00,838 --> 00:39:02,256
According to the ATP,

471
00:39:02,340 --> 00:39:05,384
Connors became number one
by a very slim margin,

472
00:39:05,468 --> 00:39:10,431
virtually nothing,
just 0.198 above Vilas's average.

473
00:39:10,514 --> 00:39:13,809
Then Vilas filed his first complaints
before the ATP.

474
00:39:13,893 --> 00:39:18,189
Almost every week,
he'd ask the people in charge of the list

475
00:39:18,272 --> 00:39:21,525
if he had gone up in the ranking.

476
00:39:21,609 --> 00:39:23,527
The answer was always the same:

477
00:39:23,611 --> 00:39:26,405
"No, Willy."
"No, Willy, you're still number two."

478
00:39:26,489 --> 00:39:30,409
That was the only answer he ever got,
he never made it to number one,

479
00:39:30,493 --> 00:39:32,536
even when he was winning every week.

480
00:39:35,748 --> 00:39:37,666
I knew I had an advantage.

481
00:39:38,292 --> 00:39:41,921
How could it be?
After so much time, how come…

482
00:39:42,546 --> 00:39:44,882
I'd never reached number one…

483
00:39:45,633 --> 00:39:46,967
not even for a single day?

484
00:40:19,750 --> 00:40:21,460
CONNORS - POINTS - AVERAGE

485
00:40:21,544 --> 00:40:25,214
15TH SEPTEMBER, 1975
22ND SEPTEMBER, 1975

486
00:40:25,297 --> 00:40:27,091
SPANISH MANUEL ORANTES
BEAT THE ARGENTINE IDOL

487
00:40:27,174 --> 00:40:29,677
Although Vilas suffered an upset

488
00:40:29,760 --> 00:40:35,599
at the 1975 US Open semifinals
in Forest Hills

489
00:40:35,683 --> 00:40:37,643
against Spanish Manuel Orantes,

490
00:40:37,726 --> 00:40:43,941
that performance propelled him
to take the next step in his career.

491
00:40:58,247 --> 00:41:04,670
According to our research,
from Monday, September 22nd, 1975,

492
00:41:04,753 --> 00:41:09,675
Guillermo Vilas was the real world
number one for the first time in his life.

493
00:41:09,758 --> 00:41:10,676
AVERAGES

494
00:41:33,491 --> 00:41:35,868
That was when he took a leap forward,

495
00:41:35,951 --> 00:41:38,662
which lasted for five more weeks,

496
00:41:39,330 --> 00:41:41,665
up to 27th October, 1975,

497
00:41:41,749 --> 00:41:44,293
when Connors became number one again.

498
00:41:46,086 --> 00:41:47,838
Connors ranked number one
for ten more weeks,

499
00:41:47,922 --> 00:41:49,882
and Vilas got it for two more,

500
00:41:49,965 --> 00:41:54,345
those starting
on 5th and 12th January, 1976.

501
00:41:54,428 --> 00:41:58,474
That sums up his seven weeks
at number one.

502
00:42:00,059 --> 00:42:02,686
Jimmy Connors earned
every one of his weeks as number one,

503
00:42:03,270 --> 00:42:05,147
our research doesn't contest that.

504
00:42:05,731 --> 00:42:09,735
He and Vilas are involuntary actors
in the official version of this story.

505
00:42:10,361 --> 00:42:13,656
Neither of them tilted the balance
in their favor or against it.

506
00:42:16,867 --> 00:42:20,246
Ţiriac, is Guillermo Vilas
changing his playing style?

507
00:42:20,329 --> 00:42:23,999
I think Guillermo should change his style,

508
00:42:24,083 --> 00:42:25,501
he should be more…

509
00:42:26,168 --> 00:42:30,839
more aggressive, go to the net
more often, hit more volley shots.

510
00:42:30,923 --> 00:42:32,925
I think he is on the right path.

511
00:42:33,008 --> 00:42:35,636
This is a complicated transition period,

512
00:42:35,719 --> 00:42:40,099
but it's his best chance
to keep playing at a high level.

513
00:42:40,182 --> 00:42:42,101
Let's hope for good luck and success.

514
00:42:42,184 --> 00:42:46,480
In any case, we'll thank you
for your work and your help

515
00:42:46,564 --> 00:42:48,566
in making Guillermo
the world number one in tennis.

516
00:42:48,649 --> 00:42:49,984
-That's what we all want.
-Thanks.

517
00:42:54,154 --> 00:42:56,115
Ţiriac had approached me
a couple of times.

518
00:42:57,032 --> 00:43:00,911
I had always played very well with him,
so I thought, "Let's try it for a month."

519
00:43:02,788 --> 00:43:05,791
After a month training with him,
I won three tournaments in a row.

520
00:43:09,545 --> 00:43:10,796
Then I called him and told him,

521
00:43:10,879 --> 00:43:12,965
"I want to hire you,
how much do you charge?"

522
00:43:13,048 --> 00:43:14,508
He asked me, "Why?"

523
00:43:14,592 --> 00:43:16,552
And I replied, "I hit my ceiling."

524
00:43:16,635 --> 00:43:19,138
"But you already won this and that…"

525
00:43:19,221 --> 00:43:22,600
"I did win those,
but it would be easier with you."

526
00:43:29,189 --> 00:43:34,445
VILAS'S COACH

527
00:43:35,487 --> 00:43:37,323
One day, Ţiriac asked me,

528
00:43:37,406 --> 00:43:42,453
"How does it feel to be
before the best coach in the world?"

529
00:43:42,536 --> 00:43:45,247
And I replied, "You know very well

530
00:43:45,331 --> 00:43:50,794
that you're before a player
who can hit any shot you ask for."

531
00:43:50,878 --> 00:43:52,796
With my technique, I can hit any shot,

532
00:43:52,880 --> 00:43:55,924
I can play however you like,
I can play on any surface,

533
00:43:56,008 --> 00:44:00,929
I can give spin to any shot
in any situation

534
00:44:01,013 --> 00:44:03,307
without hurting myself,
and I can do it for hours.

535
00:44:03,390 --> 00:44:04,767
In fact, the first test he gave me

536
00:44:04,892 --> 00:44:07,519
was to see how many hours
I could play without getting tired.

537
00:44:07,603 --> 00:44:09,438
After eight hours, he stopped.

538
00:44:11,482 --> 00:44:13,901
I told him I could go on,
but he said it was enough.

539
00:44:33,045 --> 00:44:36,256
Immediately after that,
I made it to the finals in Australia.

540
00:45:12,418 --> 00:45:13,544
I lost against Tanner.

541
00:45:25,180 --> 00:45:27,641
I started playing every tournament,
and I was doing awful.

542
00:45:27,725 --> 00:45:30,018
NICE
DEFEAT IN FINAL

543
00:45:31,103 --> 00:45:33,063
MONTE CARLO
SEMIFINALS DEFEAT

544
00:45:34,106 --> 00:45:35,315
HAMBURG
QUARTER FINALS DEFEAT

545
00:45:35,399 --> 00:45:38,736
Sometimes you need to hit rock bottom…

546
00:45:38,819 --> 00:45:40,028
ROME
SECOND ROUND DEFEAT

547
00:45:40,112 --> 00:45:41,864
…so anything going up
can lift you with it.

548
00:45:44,324 --> 00:45:47,161
Then I traveled to Hawaii.

549
00:45:49,621 --> 00:45:52,249
I had always wanted to go there alone.

550
00:45:53,041 --> 00:45:59,173
HAWAII, USA

551
00:46:02,926 --> 00:46:06,847
I remember I went to the desert.
I started running and got up a mountain.

552
00:46:06,930 --> 00:46:08,223
I watched the sunset.

553
00:46:08,307 --> 00:46:10,434
And after that, I turned

554
00:46:10,517 --> 00:46:15,063
and, of course, the light disappeared
on that side of the mountain.

555
00:46:15,731 --> 00:46:18,859
It was dark, there were coyotes,

556
00:46:19,651 --> 00:46:23,155
you could hear howls all around…
I was really scared.

557
00:46:26,909 --> 00:46:31,455
So… I stayed there for ten days,
and then Ţiriac came to see me.

558
00:46:32,289 --> 00:46:35,542
When he saw I was so down,
he told me, "I'm in charge now."

559
00:46:36,627 --> 00:46:37,836
"This will be hard."

560
00:46:52,351 --> 00:46:55,729
He started managing
everything related to my training,

561
00:46:55,813 --> 00:46:58,607
even my schedule.
I didn't have to think about anything.

562
00:46:59,441 --> 00:47:01,568
He adjusted my routine,
and he made me stop writing.

563
00:47:01,652 --> 00:47:07,324
At the time, I used to write poetry,
watch movies and read lots of books.

564
00:47:07,407 --> 00:47:11,370
"No, you must stop with all that."
He started shaping me like clay.

565
00:47:13,413 --> 00:47:14,790
I did everything he said.

566
00:47:15,499 --> 00:47:17,334
And it worked. It worked perfectly.

567
00:47:18,710 --> 00:47:22,297
He put me on a very strict diet.
I was starving.

568
00:47:22,881 --> 00:47:24,758
I was so hungry I dreamed of food.

569
00:47:36,854 --> 00:47:41,900
DECEMBER 2013

570
00:47:41,984 --> 00:47:43,402
Although it's hard to believe,

571
00:47:44,027 --> 00:47:47,239
Vilas was the last to know
about our research.

572
00:47:47,906 --> 00:47:51,285
I had been searching
for the truth for six years,

573
00:47:51,368 --> 00:47:54,913
and once I had
a solid amount of statistical data,

574
00:47:54,997 --> 00:47:56,790
I decided to inform Vilas.

575
00:47:57,749 --> 00:48:00,085
BUENOS AIRES, DECEMBER 26TH, 2013

576
00:48:00,168 --> 00:48:04,965
"Here, these are the first good news
about your ATP ranking," I said.

577
00:48:05,048 --> 00:48:10,429
He looked at them with suspicion,
run his left fingers through his hair,

578
00:48:10,512 --> 00:48:13,015
then looked at me,
asked for another cup of coffee.

579
00:48:13,098 --> 00:48:15,517
He kept talking about the weather,
the heat…

580
00:48:16,184 --> 00:48:17,978
He didn't react at all.

581
00:48:18,687 --> 00:48:21,607
VILAS PHONED PUPPO 48 HOURS LATER

582
00:48:29,823 --> 00:48:32,492
"I'm sorry," he told me,
"I was a bit cold,

583
00:48:32,576 --> 00:48:36,997
but I got so emotional,
so many things ran through my head."

584
00:48:37,080 --> 00:48:41,209
"It was the third time that I felt
something so strong related to tennis."

585
00:48:41,752 --> 00:48:44,880
"The first time was when I won
the Masters Cup, when I was a nobody."

586
00:48:44,963 --> 00:48:48,050
"The second one,
when I won my second Australia Open,

587
00:48:48,133 --> 00:48:51,303
because my father was there
and I saw him cry for the first time."

588
00:48:51,386 --> 00:48:53,597
"This is the third time."

589
00:48:57,809 --> 00:48:59,311
His last sentence

590
00:48:59,895 --> 00:49:02,814
hit me even harder.

591
00:49:02,898 --> 00:49:09,279
He said, "You have no idea
how much these pages mean to me."

592
00:49:12,366 --> 00:49:16,703
It was my first positive experience
with Vilas in relation to the research,

593
00:49:16,787 --> 00:49:20,415
but it also scared me a bit

594
00:49:21,124 --> 00:49:22,668
because approaching him could be…

595
00:49:23,585 --> 00:49:24,920
dangerous

596
00:49:25,003 --> 00:49:27,881
if I didn't get good results.

597
00:49:27,965 --> 00:49:31,593
Vilas hadn't asked me
to get him the number one ranking.

598
00:49:31,677 --> 00:49:33,470
I was involving him in this fight…

599
00:49:34,846 --> 00:49:38,976
which had a different path than his.

600
00:49:39,059 --> 00:49:41,645
Mine was a lot more aggressive.

601
00:49:42,396 --> 00:49:45,315
I regretted having given him
that envelope.

602
00:49:52,489 --> 00:49:55,742
PARIS, FRANCE

603
00:50:26,273 --> 00:50:28,859
I had played
the Roland-Garros final before.

604
00:50:28,942 --> 00:50:35,073
At the time, I had won
about 40 or 35 tournaments.

605
00:50:36,199 --> 00:50:37,659
I wasn't a rookie.

606
00:50:37,743 --> 00:50:42,372
And Ţiriac realized
that the key to playing that final

607
00:50:42,456 --> 00:50:43,915
was doubling the training.

608
00:51:06,271 --> 00:51:08,356
CLUB MEMBERS

609
00:51:08,440 --> 00:51:13,862
Here's where Vilas trained in 1977,
La Faisanderie.

610
00:51:14,863 --> 00:51:18,784
He spent May and June, 1977 training here
because it was a very quiet place,

611
00:51:18,867 --> 00:51:22,079
where Vilas was isolated
from almost everything.

612
00:51:23,413 --> 00:51:25,248
So they would meet up here.

613
00:51:33,381 --> 00:51:35,759
Vilas would sleep under the trees here.

614
00:51:37,761 --> 00:51:39,763
It's a very beautiful place.

615
00:51:48,105 --> 00:51:50,065
It used to be a pheasant hunting ground.

616
00:51:51,691 --> 00:51:53,819
It's a bit distant from downtown Paris,

617
00:51:55,028 --> 00:51:57,072
but it's a beautiful place.

618
00:52:06,248 --> 00:52:08,458
Ţiriac handled everything,
and I obeyed him.

619
00:52:11,169 --> 00:52:14,589
I realized that every time I'd try
to intervene, I'd complicate things.

620
00:52:16,716 --> 00:52:18,927
I always followed the schedule he planned,

621
00:52:19,678 --> 00:52:21,263
I did everything he told me to.

622
00:52:21,346 --> 00:52:26,101
I trained and stuck to my routine,
repeating always the same.

623
00:52:37,571 --> 00:52:39,614
I wouldn't get involved in anything.

624
00:52:46,538 --> 00:52:50,792
I just wrote in my diary every day
in order to relax.

625
00:52:51,751 --> 00:52:53,753
I was very anxious,
I couldn't sleep at night.

626
00:52:53,837 --> 00:52:57,090
PERSONAL INFORMATION

627
00:52:57,174 --> 00:52:59,676
I'M THE BEST
PARIS, MAY, 1977

628
00:52:59,759 --> 00:53:02,053
I HAVE NO DOUBTS ABOUT IT,
BUT I'LL HAVE TO PROVE IT

629
00:53:02,137 --> 00:53:04,264
AND I WILL PROVE IT BIG TIME

630
00:53:04,347 --> 00:53:08,226
THIS TROPHY WILL BE MINE
AND I'LL PROVE IT BIG TIME

631
00:54:28,598 --> 00:54:32,227
COLGATE INTERNATIONAL SERIES

632
00:55:07,053 --> 00:55:08,930
I was too focused on the other match.

633
00:55:09,014 --> 00:55:11,891
I only realized it was over
when the umpire said so.

634
00:55:17,397 --> 00:55:19,733
I knew I was playing the match point,

635
00:55:19,816 --> 00:55:23,153
but my instinct told me
one point ended and another one started.

636
00:55:23,236 --> 00:55:25,947
That's why I didn't raise my arms.

637
00:55:26,573 --> 00:55:28,491
And I turned to Ţiriac.

638
00:55:35,332 --> 00:55:37,959
Deep down, you play automatically.

639
00:55:38,543 --> 00:55:41,463
If you take a shark out of the water
it will still bite the air.

640
00:55:41,546 --> 00:55:43,673
It's out of the water,
there's nothing there.

641
00:55:43,757 --> 00:55:46,092
What is it trying to bite?
It just does, just in case.

642
00:55:46,760 --> 00:55:49,179
And I was like that shark.

643
00:55:54,142 --> 00:55:58,229
DECEMBER 4TH, 2014

644
00:55:59,439 --> 00:56:01,358
The starting point of this story

645
00:56:01,441 --> 00:56:04,778
was Thursday, December 4th, 2014.

646
00:56:04,861 --> 00:56:11,117
I clearly remember the time,
it was 2:56 p.m., Buenos Aires time,

647
00:56:11,201 --> 00:56:15,955
or 12:56 p.m.,
according to the destination time,

648
00:56:16,039 --> 00:56:18,458
Ponte Vedra Beach, in the United States.

649
00:56:19,417 --> 00:56:25,548
That was the exact moment
when I sent the whole arsenal of documents

650
00:56:25,632 --> 00:56:28,593
to the ATP Chairman directly.

651
00:56:28,676 --> 00:56:32,097
That e-mail included a link and a password

652
00:56:32,180 --> 00:56:39,145
so he could open
the 1232 encrypted files online,

653
00:56:39,229 --> 00:56:45,151
plus the 1119 pages
of the research itself.

654
00:56:52,242 --> 00:56:56,871
JOURNALIST, ESPN TENNIS

655
00:57:02,252 --> 00:57:06,005
Our research guaranteed that every doubt,

656
00:57:06,089 --> 00:57:10,510
every technical shortage,
and the ATP statistics

657
00:57:10,593 --> 00:57:16,808
were confronted with real, concrete
evidence scanned from different sources.

658
00:57:39,956 --> 00:57:41,916
I felt lonely,
although I love being alone.

659
00:57:42,000 --> 00:57:43,585
I had so much fun!

660
00:57:46,254 --> 00:57:51,509
After a match, I'd go to my room,
order room service, eat and fall asleep.

661
00:57:52,177 --> 00:57:54,053
I had no energy left.

662
00:57:57,515 --> 00:58:00,935
My sleeping schedule changed,
and when you're exhausted,

663
00:58:01,561 --> 00:58:06,024
you can't be with other people,
and nevertheless you still think a lot.

664
00:58:08,485 --> 00:58:13,281
You can have the most beautiful
and free ideas you can think of.

665
00:58:13,364 --> 00:58:15,283
My fondest memories happened at that time.

666
00:58:16,242 --> 00:58:19,287
I enjoyed the simple things in life,
like ice cream.

667
00:58:22,373 --> 00:58:25,210
When you're tired,
you prefer sedentary activities.

668
00:58:26,127 --> 00:58:27,170
I mean,

669
00:58:27,253 --> 00:58:31,466
you want your bed to be cool,
you want to turn on the air conditioner.

670
00:58:31,549 --> 00:58:34,385
They're small, simple things.

671
00:58:34,469 --> 00:58:38,306
But those are the things that can enliven
that essential stage in your life.

672
00:58:42,060 --> 00:58:45,063
THIRD ROUND

673
00:58:46,272 --> 00:58:49,275
CHAMPION

674
00:58:50,026 --> 00:58:52,278
CHAMPION

675
00:58:52,946 --> 00:58:55,240
CHAMPION

676
00:58:59,410 --> 00:59:00,286
I arrived at Gstaad

677
00:59:00,995 --> 00:59:02,539
and Thomaz Koch told me,

678
00:59:02,622 --> 00:59:05,458
"You have to come tomorrow
to see Krishnamurti,

679
00:59:05,542 --> 00:59:06,876
he's a Hindu philosopher."

680
00:59:07,710 --> 00:59:08,753
It was raining, so I went.

681
00:59:15,677 --> 00:59:22,350
VOICE OF JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI
PHILOSOPHER

682
00:59:32,860 --> 00:59:36,281
That experience blew me away.

683
00:59:38,700 --> 00:59:40,952
Suddenly, all that joy I felt had…

684
00:59:41,786 --> 00:59:44,414
some serenity attached to it.

685
00:59:44,497 --> 00:59:50,962
There were very important things
that depended on harmony, not on anxiety.

686
00:59:51,713 --> 00:59:53,256
That realization changed my life.

687
00:59:59,554 --> 01:00:01,306
We waited for an answer from the ATP.

688
01:00:01,389 --> 01:00:04,684
It came two months later,
and it was negative.

689
01:00:14,777 --> 01:00:16,279
According to the Board of Directors,

690
01:00:16,362 --> 01:00:20,908
they didn't have the full data
from the '70s,

691
01:00:20,992 --> 01:00:25,872
and therefore couldn't find the reason
for the mistakes we'd found.

692
01:00:36,132 --> 01:00:42,096
That rejection lead us to ask
Vilas himself to join our task force.

693
01:00:43,431 --> 01:00:46,684
Vilas then sent a e-mail
to Chairman Kermode personally…

694
01:00:46,768 --> 01:00:47,935
ATP CHAIRMAN 2013-2019

695
01:00:48,019 --> 01:00:49,479
…telling him, among other things,

696
01:00:49,562 --> 01:00:53,608
that he was certain
that Kermode would understand

697
01:00:53,691 --> 01:00:57,612
the very difficult and unfair position
the ATP had put him in,

698
01:00:57,695 --> 01:01:03,284
and that he felt,
as a founding member of the ATP,

699
01:01:03,368 --> 01:01:06,079
that he was free to take legal actions.

700
01:01:06,704 --> 01:01:10,375
Kermode answered him
that same day, he was quick.

701
01:01:10,458 --> 01:01:13,670
But he maintained
the same posture we already knew.

702
01:01:13,753 --> 01:01:19,300
Vilas didn't receive a more solid answer.

703
01:01:20,593 --> 01:01:22,679
NEW YORK, USA
JULY 1977

704
01:01:22,762 --> 01:01:26,516
Today I'm resuming this recording
I started some time ago,

705
01:01:27,266 --> 01:01:28,726
four days ago.

706
01:01:30,228 --> 01:01:32,313
Recording my thoughts on tape is hard.

707
01:01:32,397 --> 01:01:34,649
MESSAGE FROM VILAS
TO HIS FRIENDS CHACHO, ARTURO AND FLACO

708
01:01:34,732 --> 01:01:36,651
It seems there are no feelings involved.

709
01:01:37,527 --> 01:01:39,320
Everything here is going fine.

710
01:01:40,405 --> 01:01:42,573
I feel quite nostalgic.
I miss you terribly.

711
01:01:43,950 --> 01:01:45,535
But I feel quite close to you all.

712
01:01:45,618 --> 01:01:48,413
I look forward to going back to Argentina
so I can be with you,

713
01:01:49,205 --> 01:01:52,041
so I can share things with you.

714
01:01:52,125 --> 01:01:54,544
I plan to play very well
in the upcoming tournaments,

715
01:01:54,627 --> 01:01:56,421
I'll be in great shape.

716
01:01:57,964 --> 01:01:59,132
I'll win.

717
01:01:59,215 --> 01:02:00,174
That's my wish.

718
01:02:23,865 --> 01:02:27,869
Outside the tennis world,
Vilas was very perceptive.

719
01:02:27,952 --> 01:02:30,580
I remember he told me many times

720
01:02:30,663 --> 01:02:34,208
that, when he arrived in New York in 1977,

721
01:02:34,292 --> 01:02:36,836
he felt its atmosphere was very strange.

722
01:02:36,919 --> 01:02:40,923
There were looting, fires,
a financial crisis,

723
01:02:41,007 --> 01:02:43,551
and a terrible heatwave.

724
01:02:43,634 --> 01:02:46,387
On top of that,
the Son of Sam case was ongoing,

725
01:02:46,471 --> 01:02:50,516
he was caught
just before the US Open, in Forest Hills.

726
01:03:06,365 --> 01:03:09,076
The atmosphere was stifling
in every sense of the word,

727
01:03:09,160 --> 01:03:10,953
and Vilas noticed it.

728
01:03:19,420 --> 01:03:21,172
I was worried because I was very tired.

729
01:03:21,255 --> 01:03:23,299
I was on a winning streak.

730
01:03:23,382 --> 01:03:24,967
I had won in Kitzbühel,

731
01:03:25,051 --> 01:03:27,720
Washington, Louisville,

732
01:03:27,804 --> 01:03:29,972
Columbus, Ohio,

733
01:03:30,056 --> 01:03:33,768
South Orange, Westchester.

734
01:03:33,851 --> 01:03:35,394
I won all those in a row.

735
01:03:35,478 --> 01:03:37,104
And there I was, at the US Open.

736
01:04:16,769 --> 01:04:18,646
I entered the court soaked in sweat.

737
01:04:26,988 --> 01:04:29,365
Ţiriac had one tactic,
and I had a different one.

738
01:04:29,448 --> 01:04:33,077
I started using mine,
but it didn't work immediately.

739
01:04:47,675 --> 01:04:51,470
He had won
four or five extraordinary points,

740
01:04:51,554 --> 01:04:53,681
he was hitting amazing volleys.

741
01:04:54,557 --> 01:04:56,893
At some point, I saw the ball coming

742
01:04:56,976 --> 01:05:00,813
and I ran towards the open area,
but there was nothing there anymore.

743
01:05:23,961 --> 01:05:26,547
The hardest part of winning
is not beating the opponent,

744
01:05:26,631 --> 01:05:28,591
but convincing him he'll lose.

745
01:05:37,016 --> 01:05:40,394
We're waiting for the decision,
there's some doubt.

746
01:05:42,730 --> 01:05:46,150
Vilas has won!

747
01:05:46,233 --> 01:05:49,654
Vilas is the champion in Forest Hills!
Right now, the Argentinian is surrounded

748
01:05:49,737 --> 01:05:53,616
by a huge crowd of photographers
and spectators, it's quite chaotic.

749
01:05:53,699 --> 01:05:55,534
Vilas is the champion of the US Open!

750
01:05:55,618 --> 01:05:57,453
He's the world number one!

751
01:05:59,288 --> 01:06:02,041
For the first time
in the history of the US Open final,

752
01:06:02,124 --> 01:06:03,417
and of tennis in general,

753
01:06:03,501 --> 01:06:05,962
the spectators invaded the court.
It always happens when I play.

754
01:06:06,045 --> 01:06:08,589
Same at Roland-Garros,
but there were just 20 people then.

755
01:06:08,673 --> 01:06:09,715
Here they were 100,000.

756
01:06:14,762 --> 01:06:17,932
That last day, September 11th, 1977,

757
01:06:18,599 --> 01:06:20,559
when he arrived at the hotel at night,

758
01:06:20,643 --> 01:06:23,479
after beating Jimmy Connors
in the US Open final,

759
01:06:24,146 --> 01:06:27,066
he took this notebook, his diary,

760
01:06:27,149 --> 01:06:31,946
and when he opened it,
there was only one blank page left.

761
01:06:32,697 --> 01:06:35,032
The very last one.

762
01:06:35,116 --> 01:06:36,283
This is that page.

763
01:06:36,367 --> 01:06:38,411
And he started writing…

764
01:06:40,037 --> 01:06:41,622
that he won. He wrote how he won.

765
01:06:42,623 --> 01:06:45,751
And then he wrote, "Bravo, Guillermo.
Your friend of 25 years."

766
01:06:47,670 --> 01:06:49,964
He was his own friend at that time.

767
01:06:54,301 --> 01:06:57,263
One day before the beginning
of the 2015 Roland-Garros,

768
01:06:57,346 --> 01:07:01,475
I was contacted
by American journalist Cristopher Clarey,

769
01:07:01,559 --> 01:07:03,310
who works for The New York Times,

770
01:07:03,394 --> 01:07:05,187
because Kermode had informed him

771
01:07:05,271 --> 01:07:07,982
that the ATP wouldn't grant Vilas
the number one ranking.

772
01:07:09,442 --> 01:07:12,987
That caught me off guard.
Until then, the research was confidential.

773
01:07:13,070 --> 01:07:17,450
That article was published online
on May 25th,

774
01:07:17,533 --> 01:07:21,370
and in the printed version
of The New York Times the following day.

775
01:07:21,454 --> 01:07:23,497
The headline shocked me.

776
01:07:42,975 --> 01:07:47,146
It was a long article
where Kermode gave his point of view

777
01:07:47,229 --> 01:07:51,150
and stated that he was 100% sure,

778
01:07:51,233 --> 01:07:54,862
or at least as sure as he could be,

779
01:07:54,945 --> 01:07:58,365
that history cannot be rewritten.

780
01:08:11,462 --> 01:08:13,089
VILAS WAS NUMBER ONE IN 1975

781
01:08:13,172 --> 01:08:17,093
The impact across the tennis world news
was enormous.

782
01:08:17,176 --> 01:08:19,553
We hadn't thought of going public,

783
01:08:19,637 --> 01:08:22,223
but, at least, that accident

784
01:08:22,306 --> 01:08:27,686
was helpful
and put the topic in the media's agenda.

785
01:08:27,770 --> 01:08:30,397
WITH WEAK ARGUMENTS,
ATP REJECTS VILAS'S NUMBER ONE CLAIM

786
01:08:30,481 --> 01:08:31,774
A THOROUGH INVESTIGATION REVEALED

787
01:08:31,857 --> 01:08:34,944
THE ARGENTINE PLAYER SHOULD HAVE BEEN
NUMBER ONE IN 1975

788
01:09:17,528 --> 01:09:20,489
We should consider something very basic,

789
01:09:20,573 --> 01:09:23,659
imposed by history itself:

790
01:09:23,742 --> 01:09:26,996
when an athlete gets a result,

791
01:09:27,079 --> 01:09:30,291
that result belongs to them forever.

792
01:09:30,374 --> 01:09:35,546
No one can manipulate their achievements
nor tell them what to do with them.

793
01:09:35,629 --> 01:09:39,884
Neither the ATP, the ITF, the journalists
nor the athletes themselves can change it.

794
01:09:39,967 --> 01:09:43,512
It's their right, it doesn't prescribe,
and it's inalienable.

795
01:09:46,932 --> 01:09:51,854
In May 2015, Vilas authorized
the addition of a lawyer to the team,

796
01:09:51,937 --> 01:09:54,690
so he could get a legal point of view.

797
01:09:54,773 --> 01:09:57,818
This lawyer was
Adrián Sautu de la Riestra.

798
01:09:57,902 --> 01:10:02,072
He took on our legal representation
before the ATP.

799
01:10:03,199 --> 01:10:07,203
At first, we offered the ATP
an arbitration…

800
01:10:07,286 --> 01:10:08,370
LAWYER

801
01:10:08,454 --> 01:10:11,081
…previous to a declaratory relief action

802
01:10:11,165 --> 01:10:14,376
to recognize
Guillermo's world number one ranking.

803
01:10:15,085 --> 01:10:17,213
We also made it clear

804
01:10:17,796 --> 01:10:20,841
that he wasn't seeking
a monetary compensation.

805
01:10:46,533 --> 01:10:48,994
NEW YORK, USA
JANUARY 1978

806
01:10:51,622 --> 01:10:53,999
In the '70s tennis world,

807
01:10:54,083 --> 01:10:55,751
there was a much-anticipated tradition:

808
01:10:55,834 --> 01:10:59,046
the cover
of the influential magazine World Tennis,

809
01:10:59,129 --> 01:11:01,590
especially their issue
with the season summary.

810
01:11:01,674 --> 01:11:04,134
On that cover,
they put the tennis player who,

811
01:11:04,218 --> 01:11:08,264
according to their journalistic criteria,
had been number one that year.

812
01:11:08,347 --> 01:11:11,892
And to decide
who that player was in 1977,

813
01:11:11,976 --> 01:11:15,896
the magazine editors
waited until the Masters Cup final,

814
01:11:15,980 --> 01:11:19,275
in January 1978, between Borg and Connors.

815
01:11:20,067 --> 01:11:21,735
JANUARY 1978

816
01:11:21,819 --> 01:11:25,072
That year,
Connors had won nine tournaments.

817
01:11:26,031 --> 01:11:27,157
Borg had won seven.

818
01:11:28,033 --> 01:11:29,410
I had won 14.

819
01:11:30,035 --> 01:11:32,705
Both of them had won one Gran Slam each.

820
01:11:32,788 --> 01:11:35,416
I had won two, and I had made it
to the final in another one.

821
01:11:35,499 --> 01:11:36,959
I doubled their achievements.

822
01:11:37,584 --> 01:11:40,963
But, at that moment,
everything depended on that result.

823
01:11:41,046 --> 01:11:42,047
JIMMY CONNORS
USA

824
01:11:42,131 --> 01:11:44,466
Connors had no chance,
he hadn't won anything.

825
01:11:44,550 --> 01:11:46,218
I needed him to win.

826
01:11:47,136 --> 01:11:49,513
I didn't want to go see the final,
it was too moving for me.

827
01:11:49,596 --> 01:11:50,681
It was too hard.

828
01:11:55,644 --> 01:11:58,897
I did something unusual.

829
01:11:59,940 --> 01:12:02,443
I remember I went to Woodstock.

830
01:12:02,526 --> 01:12:03,527
WOODSTOCK, USA
JANUARY 1978

831
01:12:03,610 --> 01:12:04,528
Woodstock.

832
01:12:07,448 --> 01:12:11,660
There, I had my first contact
with real freedom

833
01:12:11,744 --> 01:12:13,537
when I attended the Woodstock Festival.

834
01:12:21,462 --> 01:12:23,672
In Woodstock, I felt that freedom again.

835
01:12:24,548 --> 01:12:29,053
I saw those plains and thought,
"Honestly, if the other one wins,

836
01:12:29,887 --> 01:12:30,888
maybe…"

837
01:12:31,764 --> 01:12:35,059
"That could happen. If so, I should 
build myself a shack and come live here."

838
01:12:36,018 --> 01:12:36,894
"Out of spite."

839
01:12:48,947 --> 01:12:50,407
That night I traveled back

840
01:12:51,033 --> 01:12:53,869
and arrived quite late,
I was staying at the Plaza Hotel.

841
01:12:57,414 --> 01:13:01,085
I came in quietly,
and then I ran into Donald Dell.

842
01:13:01,794 --> 01:13:03,045
He asked me…

843
01:13:06,715 --> 01:13:07,800
I said, "No, I didn't."

844
01:13:08,300 --> 01:13:09,301
"Who won?"

845
01:13:10,886 --> 01:13:13,639
"Connors," he said.

846
01:13:15,307 --> 01:13:16,683
I asked him,

847
01:13:17,768 --> 01:13:19,186
"How was it all?"

848
01:13:19,269 --> 01:13:22,523
I tried not to laugh or smile,
and I said, "Was it a good match?"

849
01:13:23,774 --> 01:13:26,568
Then I went to my room…

850
01:13:27,528 --> 01:13:29,363
and I stayed in there.

851
01:13:31,156 --> 01:13:33,742
I laid there,
staring at the ceiling all night long.

852
01:13:42,292 --> 01:13:45,212
The next day,
I went to Aerolíneas Argentinas

853
01:13:45,295 --> 01:13:46,713
and bought a flight ticket.

854
01:13:46,797 --> 01:13:47,798
I got on the plane.

855
01:13:48,966 --> 01:13:53,595
And then the captain came to see me,
he was a very close friend of mine.

856
01:13:54,930 --> 01:13:56,640
He told me, "Guillermo…

857
01:13:59,184 --> 01:14:00,769
Ţiriac sent this to you."

858
01:14:06,400 --> 01:14:09,278
I opened it
and it was the World Tennis magazine.

859
01:14:09,736 --> 01:14:11,864
The issue with the number one player.

860
01:14:13,615 --> 01:14:17,578
VILAS NUMBER ONE!

861
01:14:17,661 --> 01:14:19,955
FOR VILAS…

862
01:14:20,038 --> 01:14:22,082
All of us had done the photo session.

863
01:14:22,749 --> 01:14:24,543
Me, Borg, you know?

864
01:14:24,626 --> 01:14:27,212
Because we knew
one of us would be the number one.

865
01:14:27,296 --> 01:14:28,922
They were waiting for that.

866
01:14:30,466 --> 01:14:32,634
And when I saw it,

867
01:14:33,385 --> 01:14:38,307
I ordered champagne.
I drank a lot that day.

868
01:14:38,390 --> 01:14:40,392
A lot, yeah, but I had earned it.

869
01:14:49,485 --> 01:14:50,986
JUNE 2015

870
01:14:51,069 --> 01:14:54,072
One morning in June 2015, Vilas told me,

871
01:14:54,823 --> 01:14:57,701
"Man, you have to write about my life,

872
01:14:57,784 --> 01:14:59,953
and I want you to be
the custodian of my belongings."

873
01:15:05,083 --> 01:15:07,920
"I want you to have
all the tennis-related things

874
01:15:08,003 --> 01:15:09,713
that I've kept since I was a kid."

875
01:15:09,796 --> 01:15:11,632
"As well as things related to my parents,

876
01:15:11,715 --> 01:15:14,009
things related to tennis, to music…"

877
01:15:14,092 --> 01:15:17,471
"Well, everything, so you can keep it
and nothing gets lost."

878
01:15:17,554 --> 01:15:21,308
I need someone I trust to take care
of all my things, and I thought of you."

879
01:15:24,311 --> 01:15:27,314
He also told me,
"You know what is important for me."

880
01:15:27,397 --> 01:15:30,984
"I want these things to remain
in Argentina, where my story started,

881
01:15:31,068 --> 01:15:32,736
they have to end up here."

882
01:15:34,738 --> 01:15:38,575
Making an inventory of everything…

883
01:15:40,077 --> 01:15:44,039
all the stuff that Guillermo had kept

884
01:15:45,123 --> 01:15:50,045
was a huge task, 
there were so many things.

885
01:15:50,128 --> 01:15:53,257
You could find
every piece of paper, every t-shirt,

886
01:15:53,340 --> 01:15:55,384
the one he was wearing
when he won Roland-Garros,

887
01:15:55,467 --> 01:15:58,387
every item Guillermo had.

888
01:15:59,471 --> 01:16:01,723
All that was part of his story,

889
01:16:01,807 --> 01:16:05,352
it was like having him there
telling you everything.

890
01:16:06,186 --> 01:16:07,563
It was very moving.

891
01:16:09,106 --> 01:16:12,526
This is a notebook where he wrote…
Well, it's full of tactics.

892
01:16:16,655 --> 01:16:18,907
Here he drew the tennis court,

893
01:16:18,991 --> 01:16:22,202
because, according to his ideas,
the court has a soul.

894
01:16:23,245 --> 01:16:27,624
"Like everything else."
So here he explains that concept,

895
01:16:27,708 --> 01:16:32,671
the court's soul, which way to get in
and which way to get out of the court.

896
01:16:32,754 --> 01:16:36,758
He doesn't want
to go into detail about this

897
01:16:36,842 --> 01:16:39,261
because this is one
of his technical secrets.

898
01:16:40,637 --> 01:16:42,889
Vilas told me, "Please, as a favor,

899
01:16:43,557 --> 01:16:45,976
keep my notebooks somewhere safe."

900
01:16:46,059 --> 01:16:47,686
"I don't want them to get lost."

901
01:16:47,769 --> 01:16:51,898
"They're part of my story,
I wrote in them every day."

902
01:16:51,982 --> 01:16:55,611
"I want to leave them in your care,
I know you'll protect them."

903
01:16:55,694 --> 01:16:59,197
"And if something should happened to me…
you'll know what to do."

904
01:17:00,991 --> 01:17:04,703
He looked me in the eyes.
His were red, as usual.

905
01:17:04,786 --> 01:17:05,954
He gave me a hug,

906
01:17:06,038 --> 01:17:09,499
which was a way to seal
that spiritual pact we were making.

907
01:17:09,583 --> 01:17:12,919
That was
another very moving moment for me.

908
01:17:14,546 --> 01:17:19,343
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

909
01:17:28,018 --> 01:17:32,648
I won my first tournament,
the Masters Cup, without having a coach.

910
01:17:33,482 --> 01:17:36,068
I had traveled with Belfonte.

911
01:17:36,151 --> 01:17:39,738
I brought him again to keep the tradition,
because I had no coach again,

912
01:17:39,821 --> 01:17:41,531
and I invited my father.

913
01:17:45,118 --> 01:17:45,994
"Dad…

914
01:17:47,037 --> 01:17:49,873
come to Australia,
but you'll have to do as I say."

915
01:17:50,540 --> 01:17:52,584
"You'll have to follow my every move."

916
01:17:52,668 --> 01:17:54,961
"You can't do anything on your own."

917
01:17:55,045 --> 01:17:56,672
"We have to be a team."

918
01:17:56,755 --> 01:17:59,091
"You have to make me feel
we're on the same page."

919
01:17:59,758 --> 01:18:00,717
And he did.

920
01:18:27,786 --> 01:18:32,499
We played,
and I managed to win without a coach,

921
01:18:33,125 --> 01:18:34,042
and I had the chance

922
01:18:34,584 --> 01:18:36,628
to have my father see me win a Grand Slam.

923
01:18:36,712 --> 01:18:40,132
None of my loved ones had seen me
win one before, they'd get very nervous.

924
01:18:59,651 --> 01:19:02,779
At the end,
my father cried when I received the cup.

925
01:19:03,530 --> 01:19:07,868
He wasn't the crying kind,
that was one of the few times he cried.

926
01:19:07,951 --> 01:19:11,496
He started crying at the bleachers.
He was quite moved.

927
01:19:15,292 --> 01:19:17,711
We were staying at the Hilton,
and he told me,

928
01:19:17,794 --> 01:19:21,715
"This hotel
should be called 'Alcatraz Hilton.'"

929
01:19:21,798 --> 01:19:26,636
And he added, "Your life is beautiful,
but I wouldn't want it for the world."

930
01:19:26,720 --> 01:19:30,766
"I wouldn't want to suffer again
what I suffered in these last two weeks."

931
01:19:31,433 --> 01:19:32,601
"I don't envy you at all."

932
01:19:32,684 --> 01:19:35,187
"I love how passionate you are
about this sport."

933
01:19:35,812 --> 01:19:39,691
"I don't think it's worth it,
to live enslaved to tennis,

934
01:19:39,775 --> 01:19:42,027
because you're too into this

935
01:19:42,110 --> 01:19:44,446
and you'll never be able
to leave it behind."

936
01:19:44,529 --> 01:19:45,781
"I hope you'll be happy."

937
01:19:45,864 --> 01:19:49,201
"I wish you happiness,
but I'll never watch you play again."

938
01:19:49,284 --> 01:19:50,535
And he never did.

939
01:20:06,259 --> 01:20:09,054
DECEMBER 2016

940
01:20:09,137 --> 01:20:12,265
I kept going to Vilas's house
to revise his book.

941
01:20:12,349 --> 01:20:15,727
One morning,
his lawyer visited us unannounced.

942
01:20:17,729 --> 01:20:22,108
He stayed just for 10 or 15 minutes,
but the news was very promising.

943
01:20:24,194 --> 01:20:25,987
In December 2016,

944
01:20:26,071 --> 01:20:30,283
I had had very positive conversations
with lawyers linked to the ATP.

945
01:20:30,951 --> 01:20:35,121
We were heading towards the acknowledgment
of the number one ranking.

946
01:20:35,914 --> 01:20:38,667
We really felt we were getting closer.

947
01:20:39,459 --> 01:20:41,962
So I went to tell Guillermo about it.

948
01:20:43,755 --> 01:20:46,925
Our lawyer left, we were alone again.

949
01:20:47,676 --> 01:20:50,929
Then I lived
the most intense moment with Vilas,

950
01:20:51,012 --> 01:20:55,058
when he felt,
for the first time in his life,

951
01:20:55,141 --> 01:20:58,061
that he could receive
the number one ranking,

952
01:20:58,144 --> 01:21:00,939
and that his fight could come to an end.

953
01:21:01,022 --> 01:21:04,651
And just by chance,
the camera I had put on the table

954
01:21:04,734 --> 01:21:09,656
to record
Guillermo's corrections to the book,

955
01:21:09,739 --> 01:21:10,991
kept on recording.

956
01:21:12,284 --> 01:21:16,246
Who would you like to dedicate it to?

957
01:21:17,330 --> 01:21:20,166
-Honestly…
-Your number one ranking.

958
01:21:20,250 --> 01:21:22,252
I mean…

959
01:21:22,335 --> 01:21:26,172
After all that hard work you did,
all those--

960
01:21:26,256 --> 01:21:29,175
Do you remember those times
I got angry and you did too?

961
01:21:29,259 --> 01:21:33,305
You know? You understood…

962
01:21:34,556 --> 01:21:35,515
You know?

963
01:21:36,182 --> 01:21:38,268
Sometimes I'd get angry

964
01:21:38,351 --> 01:21:42,355
and you'd tell me,
"Oh, you're mad at me and not at them."

965
01:21:42,439 --> 01:21:46,276
I was never mad at--
It's just the whole situation.

966
01:21:46,359 --> 01:21:47,903
It makes me think,

967
01:21:48,737 --> 01:21:50,697
"I did that all the time."

968
01:22:02,626 --> 01:22:03,543
It's over.

969
01:22:08,632 --> 01:22:10,800
-Those fucking bastards, dear God.
-It's over.

970
01:22:11,760 --> 01:22:14,554
"My man," like you always call me…

971
01:22:14,638 --> 01:22:15,931
-Thanks, my friend.
-My man.

972
01:22:17,641 --> 01:22:20,810
-This arm did it.
-Thanks.

973
01:22:20,894 --> 01:22:23,980
-Where you have your brother's name.
-There he is.

974
01:22:26,858 --> 01:22:29,152
-I love you, man.
-Thank you.

975
01:22:41,539 --> 01:22:43,041
Thanks for everything.

976
01:22:52,550 --> 01:22:53,468
We got it.

977
01:22:55,679 --> 01:22:56,680
I just hope it won't…

978
01:22:57,430 --> 01:22:59,683
-vanish again.
-It won't.

979
01:23:01,393 --> 01:23:03,728
Guillermo,
his wife Phiang and their children

980
01:23:03,812 --> 01:23:07,440
left Argentina on December 19th, 2016.

981
01:23:11,778 --> 01:23:12,779
ON MAY 9TH, 2018,

982
01:23:12,862 --> 01:23:15,657
THE ATP BOARD OF DIRECTORS
GAVE THEIR THIRD ADVERSE VERDICT

983
01:23:15,740 --> 01:23:18,410
AND THEY WON'T GIVE THE CASE
FURTHER CONSIDERATION

984
01:23:18,493 --> 01:23:19,703
After that negative answer,

985
01:23:19,786 --> 01:23:24,249
we started several legal proceedings
around the world.

986
01:23:25,500 --> 01:23:29,212
PARIS, FRANCE

987
01:24:05,540 --> 01:24:06,458
William,

988
01:24:07,167 --> 01:24:08,084
how are you?

989
01:24:11,087 --> 01:24:12,005
Fine, great.

990
01:24:13,173 --> 01:24:14,340
Yes, I'm in Paris already.

991
01:24:15,592 --> 01:24:19,179
Yes. First of all, I want you to know,

992
01:24:19,262 --> 01:24:22,724
what you said about the rackets…
I already have them with me.

993
01:24:23,433 --> 01:24:24,517
There were a lot of them.

994
01:24:27,562 --> 01:24:32,734
Yes, I'm traveling to Monaco in two days.

995
01:24:32,817 --> 01:24:34,694
We'll meet soon, then.

996
01:24:35,278 --> 01:24:36,529
At last, right?

997
01:24:39,032 --> 01:24:40,283
Send my regards to everyone.

998
01:24:40,950 --> 01:24:43,870
Bye, William. Bye.

999
01:25:22,033 --> 01:25:26,955
Early in 2017, with the Vilases
already settled in Monaco,

1000
01:25:27,038 --> 01:25:30,166
we went on revising his book by phone.

1001
01:25:31,876 --> 01:25:35,880
Through the distance, on every call,
I started noticing something was changing.

1002
01:25:36,589 --> 01:25:40,343
Guillermo was finding it harder
to remember details.

1003
01:25:42,345 --> 01:25:43,930
"I'm a tennis player," he told me.

1004
01:25:44,848 --> 01:25:46,683
"I can't give up."

1005
01:25:47,725 --> 01:25:49,602
That was the answer I was hoping for.

1006
01:26:06,786 --> 01:26:13,126
MONACO

1007
01:26:26,556 --> 01:26:27,432
ARRIVALS

1008
01:26:49,537 --> 01:26:50,872
-Puppo!
-Yeah, it's me.

1009
01:26:52,498 --> 01:26:53,958
Oh, Puppo!

1010
01:26:58,296 --> 01:27:00,381
Puppo!

1011
01:27:00,465 --> 01:27:04,344
Oh, damn, it's so good you're here!

1012
01:27:05,845 --> 01:27:07,764
This is so great!

1013
01:27:07,847 --> 01:27:09,432
-How are you?
-How are you?

1014
01:27:09,515 --> 01:27:10,850
-Fine.
-Yeah?

1015
01:27:10,934 --> 01:27:12,518
-It's so nice to see you.
-Yeah.

1016
01:27:12,602 --> 01:27:16,022
-See? I came.
-Yes, thank you.

1017
01:27:17,398 --> 01:27:20,985
You must be really familiar
with this one, the Jack Kramer.

1018
01:27:21,069 --> 01:27:22,946
-Yes.
-It's signed.

1019
01:27:28,493 --> 01:27:29,410
Look.

1020
01:27:30,870 --> 01:27:32,038
The signature.

1021
01:27:32,121 --> 01:27:34,832
Let's see. The strings are all loose.

1022
01:27:36,751 --> 01:27:37,877
It's perfect.

1023
01:27:38,878 --> 01:27:42,006
-Isn't it heavy?
-No. It's not heavy.

1024
01:27:42,090 --> 01:27:44,300
-It's very good.
-It's not heavy for your arm.

1025
01:27:44,384 --> 01:27:45,301
Sure.

1026
01:27:51,975 --> 01:27:53,685
At that time…

1027
01:27:54,602 --> 01:27:57,355
-Yeah, we were younger.
-We were still okay.

1028
01:27:57,438 --> 01:27:58,439
Yeah, right.

1029
01:27:59,732 --> 01:28:00,817
Yeah, it's true.

1030
01:28:02,527 --> 01:28:03,528
-Yours.
-Mine.

1031
01:28:04,320 --> 01:28:05,238
Good. Yours!

1032
01:28:06,322 --> 01:28:07,824
"Guillermo Vilas."

1033
01:28:09,158 --> 01:28:10,535
"1982."

1034
01:28:11,160 --> 01:28:14,372
"Guillermo Vilas and Jimmy Connors, 1981."

1035
01:28:14,455 --> 01:28:16,708
-This was the final that got suspended.
-Yes.

1036
01:28:19,127 --> 01:28:23,131
Waiting for the resolution
was complicated, emotionally speaking,

1037
01:28:23,214 --> 01:28:26,426
mainly because we started a friendship.

1038
01:28:26,509 --> 01:28:31,723
Our journalist-tennis player relationship
changed

1039
01:28:31,806 --> 01:28:35,476
and eventually we became friends.

1040
01:28:36,561 --> 01:28:37,812
There's only us on the boat.

1041
01:28:37,895 --> 01:28:40,356
Sure, who else would get on a boat
on a rainy day?

1042
01:28:40,440 --> 01:28:41,357
I would.

1043
01:28:41,441 --> 01:28:42,317
Just us.

1044
01:28:43,901 --> 01:28:47,655
Sure. I really love water.

1045
01:28:47,739 --> 01:28:49,198
-Water…
-Yeah, it's beautiful.

1046
01:28:51,034 --> 01:28:53,619
It's not that he chose me or I chose him,

1047
01:28:53,703 --> 01:28:58,499
life just brought us closer.

1048
01:28:58,583 --> 01:29:02,003
And now,
seeing him and being so close to him

1049
01:29:02,086 --> 01:29:04,130
is something hard to explain.

1050
01:29:04,213 --> 01:29:06,215
I'll never be able to explain it.

1051
01:29:06,299 --> 01:29:08,092
I am very thankful for this.

1052
01:29:10,136 --> 01:29:11,721
-Guillermo Vilas?
-Yes.

1053
01:29:11,804 --> 01:29:13,765
-What remains of him.
-I'm Argentinian.

1054
01:29:13,848 --> 01:29:15,224
-Nice to meet you.
-How are you?

1055
01:29:15,308 --> 01:29:18,186
I named my son after you.

1056
01:29:18,269 --> 01:29:19,854
-Martín Guillermo.
-Guillermo.

1057
01:29:19,937 --> 01:29:21,773
I gave him his middle name after you.

1058
01:29:21,856 --> 01:29:22,899
That's amazing!

1059
01:29:25,276 --> 01:29:26,861
-It's so nice.
-He was--

1060
01:29:26,944 --> 01:29:29,614
He named his son after you.

1061
01:29:34,744 --> 01:29:40,041
I'll never be able
to forget Vilas's words…

1062
01:29:41,084 --> 01:29:42,293
words he had kept inside…

1063
01:29:44,128 --> 01:29:46,714
when he thanked me for what I did.

1064
01:29:46,798 --> 01:29:53,429
He saw I trusted in his achievements
and made his fight my own.

1065
01:29:55,890 --> 01:29:59,060
And he also thanked me
for being by his side…

1066
01:30:00,561 --> 01:30:03,064
as he gave his last step
as a tennis player.

1067
01:30:05,066 --> 01:30:07,527
According to him,
it was the most important step of all.

1068
01:30:08,194 --> 01:30:09,278
And what moved me the most

1069
01:30:09,362 --> 01:30:12,949
during this friendship
was when he told me…

1070
01:30:21,541 --> 01:30:23,418
I was a miracle in his life.

1071
01:30:24,752 --> 01:30:30,216
COLGATE SERIES

1072
01:31:12,258 --> 01:31:16,721
I remember something he told me
when I was quite young.

1073
01:31:16,804 --> 01:31:20,349
He told me anyone can run
from one side to the other,

1074
01:31:20,433 --> 01:31:23,853
but running forward and back

1075
01:31:23,936 --> 01:31:27,023
was always a bit more complicated.

1076
01:31:27,106 --> 01:31:30,943
You must try to push the opponent

1077
01:31:31,027 --> 01:31:33,654
out of their comfort zone.

1078
01:31:51,255 --> 01:31:55,301
We all know how much he fought.
He left everything on the court,

1079
01:31:55,384 --> 01:31:56,886
it meant the world to him.

1080
01:31:56,969 --> 01:31:58,554
So, I can imagine

1081
01:31:58,638 --> 01:32:03,559
being acknowledged as the number one
would be great.

1082
01:32:43,099 --> 01:32:44,892
Vilas played his last match
in 1992, at age 40.

1083
01:32:44,976 --> 01:32:46,477
He won 62 titles in five continents

1084
01:32:46,561 --> 01:32:48,479
and was ranked top ten
for nine consecutive years.

1085
01:32:48,563 --> 01:32:50,273
He holds several records, 
including the one

1086
01:32:50,356 --> 01:32:52,567
for most official tournaments won
in a year (16 in 1977).

1087
01:32:52,650 --> 01:32:54,986
He married Phiangphathu Khumueang
in 2005 and has 4 children.

1088
01:32:55,653 --> 01:32:58,197
After 45 years, the seven weeks
during which Vilas was number one

1089
01:32:58,281 --> 01:32:59,615
are still unrecognized by the ATP,

1090
01:32:59,699 --> 01:33:02,243
despite having more than 1200 pieces
of evidence confirming it.

1091
01:33:02,326 --> 01:33:05,246
In six years of negotiations, the ATP
hasn't provided any counterevidence.

1092
01:33:05,329 --> 01:33:07,081
Guillermo Vilas,
Eduardo Puppo and their team

1093
01:33:07,164 --> 01:33:08,833
will go on
until the truth is acknowledged.

1094
01:34:10,186 --> 01:34:15,316
DEDICATED TO WILLY
WITH ALL OUR LOVE AND ADMIRATION

1095
01:34:42,885 --> 01:34:47,640
IN LOVING MEMORY
OF JUAN CARLOS BELFONTE, "THE TEACHER"