"I probably lost about 10 years of my life playing this, I think both of us were playing really, really tight and you know it was really a crap-shoot in the tiebreak," the Russian said.
"I was up two breaks in the third set and still went to the tiebreak, so it was definitely nerve-racking. I don't want to make it a habit of taking matches to three sets, especially the finals," he said.
He won four successive three-setters for his first title. Little more than a week ago in Moscow, he was the surprise choice by Russia to play Andy Roddick in the Davis Cup semifinals, and won 17-15 in the fifth set to advance Russia to the final.
RSS