"It's unbelievable" says former Djokovic fitness coach Gritsch on the Serbian's athletic ability

His former fitness coach Gebhart Gritsch tends to agree with those assessments as he recalled his time working with Djokovic in an interview with Sport Tirol. Gritsch worked with Djokovic from 2009 till 2017 spending up to 40 weeks with him on the tour. Recalling that he said:

"On average, I was on the road with Novak for 40 weeks a year, an incredibly intense time. How he moves, can still control the ball where others would have lost their balance - all of this is unbelievable, it was great fun."

They started working together after Djokovic reached out to him and Gritsch remembers it vividly:

"I had seized this huge opportunity to work with a great tennis player. When I started, was Djokovic was number three. My first task was to get him into top physical shape. The breakthrough came in 2011 when he overtook Federer and Nadal - it's impressive how long his series lasted. Especially when you know how difficult it is to get the number to become one and then to stay."