Tennis Updates: Rafael Nadal reached 6,000 days in the top ten of the ATP rankings on Wednesday. The Spaniard broke into the top-10 for the first time when he was 18 years old in April 2005, and he hasn't left since.
Nadal holds the record for the most weeks in the top ten of the men's rankings in a row. He's now set a new record of 836, which equates to 16 years in a row.
Jimmy Connors is second on the record with 789 weeks, followed by Roger Federer with 734 weeks, Ivan Lendl with 619 weeks, and Pete Sampras with 535 weeks. Rafael Nadal's 16-year run in the top ten puts him in a tie with Jimmy Connors and Andre Agassi for the all-time lead, and he's two years behind Roger Federer.
The Spaniard also holds a handful of other notable ranking records. Nadal holds the record for the most consecutive weeks as World No. 2 (160), and he is the only player to have reclaimed the World No. 1 title four times, as mentioned in the latest tennis news reports.
Furthermore, Rafael Nadal is tied for second with Jimmy Connors and Roger Federer on five year-end World No. 1 finishes, while Novak Djokovic and Pete Sampras have a combined six.
Rafael Nadal is expected to remain in the top ten until at least the beginning of 2022.
Rafael Nadal's 16-year run in the top ten is the longest in men's tennis history. Despite missing most of the 2021 season, the 35-year-old is unlikely to drop out of the top ten this year.
After reaching the quarterfinals of the Australian Open this year, Nadal only competed throughout the clay season due to a back issue. He won trophies in Barcelona and Rome, but a longstanding foot ailment returned after his Roland Garros quarterfinal loss to Djokovic. His 33-match winning streak in Paris came to an end with the outcome, which was only his third loss in the French Open in his career.
Rafael Nadal has only played two matches since then, both in Washington, and has appeared to be in a lot of discomforts. The Spaniard ended his season just before the start of the US Open.
Rafael Nadal has dropped to sixth in the ATP rankings and will be defending semifinal points at Indian Wells, the Paris Masters, and the ATP Finals over the next few weeks. However, he is as high as seventh in the year-to-date rankings, implying that at least four players must outscore him to knock him out of the top ten.
Felix Auger-Aliassime, Hubert Hurkacz, Jannik Sinner, and Casper Ruud, for example, are presently over 2,000 points behind Rafael Nadal in the rankings. If they want to break the Spaniard's top-ten streak, they'll have to make significant improvements over the following several months.