Carson Branstine’s next goal: Top 100 before deleting Uber driver app

Canada’s Carson Branstine had a relatively short journey at the recently concluded Wimbledon. The 24-year-old won three qualifying round matches but was eventually knocked out after losing in the first round to world number Aryna Sabalenka in straight sets with a score of 6-1, 7-5.

Despite that, Branstine will remember that journey for some very interesting reasons. Not long ago, Branstine was thinking of quitting tennis and even applied for a job, but did not go for a final interview. During an interview on The Slice Tennis podcast, released on July 9, Branstine explained that she had given herself a chance and decided not to pursue the interview.

“I applied for venture capital job and I got called back and everything, I felt like if I would have gone for that, I would have for sure got hired,” she said. “It was in Down Town Las Angeles. I knew what my salary would have been. So, I was not that far. If it was not Roland Garros, it was something else.”

On social media, Branstine shared her next objective as well. In a post on July 08, she stated that her next objective is to get into the top-100 players in WTA rankings before deleting the Uber driver app. She also shared that she hasn't taken any rides as a driver yet, as per the application rules, she must be over 25. “Told myself I have to break top 100 before I delete the uber driver app 😭😭🤞🏼🙅🏽‍♀️ motivating & slightly triggering notification to say the least hahahah,” she wrote.

During the same interview, Branstine shared her experience of playing against Sabalenka, which, according to her, gave her a lot of confidence going into the future matches as she knows she has the ‘game’ and ‘weapons’ to take on the best players in the world.

“It was a huge confidence boost for sure,” she said. “I mean, the first set was not great and a lot of people said I was nervous. But I was actually not nervous once I was out there. Its just like you think you have a gam plan but she was the number one in the world. So it doesn’t really matter what you do. She can clearly beat anybody. So in the first set I felt like I was trying to find my ground. But after I got my first game and had that funny moment with the crowd, I was like ok I have been in a lot of these games, even though I am making errors, I am still hitting winners and my serve could be so much better right now. So let’s just go on that and see if I can hold and I started to hold every time and I realised that once we go on and played rallies, I was winning those rallies. Then looking at stats afterwards, even though 6-1, 7-5, we both hit same amount of winners (17), I had seven aces and she only had three, and all dictating stats, I was equal or better. So I was like okay, it was a huge thing that I was the one making the mistakes there. I was actually beating myself. So taking that into account, I know I have my game, I have my weapons and sky is the limit.”