Thursday, 04 June 2026 / Published in Maja Chawalinska, Roland Garros

My totally preposterous Roland Garros prediction – that’s coming true!

G’day from Roland Garros,

Firstly, this is a true story. 😀🇫🇷🎾

Over the past few years, I have worked with French player Carole Monnet and her coach, Hervé Romain. Carole is currently ranked #196 in singles and #193 in doubles.

My son, Rourke, and I watched Carole’s Roland Garros round-one qualifying match (Mon May 18), where she battled hard against Polina Iatcenko, to win 6-4, 4-6, 7-6(4), on court six. Carole hit 23 forehand winners and won 19/33 (58%) at net. Carole employs an aggressive game style and likes to go toe-to-toe from the baseline against opponents. It’s a power-baseline game.

Two days later, Carole was scheduled to play her second round of qualifying on Court Suzanne Lenglen against a player I had never heard of before.

Her name is Maja Chawalinska.

Rourke and I sat down and watched the players warm up. Carole was hitting the ball well and looked to be ready for the battle. My attention then went to her opponent. She was a lefty. She moved well. Lots of small steps. Strokes looked clean. Instantly impressive.

I kept watching Maja. And with each successive shot she hit in the warm-up, I became more and more entranced with her game. A few more shots and I was locked in. A few more shots, and my jaw was on the ground. She hadn’t missed a shot. Not one. Her strokes were so clean, her preparation so on point, that her errors were going to be few and far between.

Carole was going to have a real battle on her hands. Carole likes to hit big, and she likes opponents to hit big with her. She likes the ball hard off her hips. She was not going to be fed that ball at all vs. Maja.

Then I turned to my 19-year-old son and said something so completely preposterous that he just laughed.

I told Rourke that Maja was going to win the tournament – while they were still warming up.

He thought I was crazy. He thought I meant that she would make it through qualifying to the main draw. No, I said. She was going to win Roland Garros. The whole enchilada.

Maja won the first five points against Carole and 18 of the first 21. She made her first error of the match on the 21st point. She lost six points in six games in Set one. Carole didn’t see a ball that she could devour.

Maja is now in the semi-finals and will play 22-year-old Diana Shnaider (seeded 25) for a spot in the final.

Dream run. Dream draw. Here are her 2026 Roland Garros results to the semi -finals.

Q1 def. A. Rame 6-0, 6-3
Q2 def. C. Monnet 6-0, 6-1
Q3 def. S. Lamens 7-6(4), 7-5
Rd 1 def. Q Zheng 6-4, 6-0
Rd 2 def. E, Mertens 6-4, 6-0
Rd 3 def. M. Sakkari 1-6, 6-3, 6-2
Rd 4 def. D. Parry 6-3, 6-2
Qtr def. A. Kalinskaya 7-6(3), 6-3

IMPROVE YOUR ODDS OF HOLDING SERVE

Webinar 3: Serve Strategy And Patterns

Webinar 16: Serve +1 Strategy

Webinar 21: Serve And Volley / Return And Volley

Webinar 34: The Eight Serve Locations

Webinar 54: First Point Of The Game

So what did I see in the warm-up that led me to make such a bold (crazy) prediction? Five things.

1) Forehands – Shape Of The Ball

Maja prepares her racket back high to get above the ball. She does this so she can easily drop under it and rip up the back of the ball at contact. Her typical forehands are way, wayyy away from the net with massive rotation. That makes for a big rainbow arc of the shot. It makes it almost impossible to step into. Opponents are regularly making contact above their head, where they can’t hurt her at all.

Maja’s forehand dominates her matches. She uses her forehand to set a perfect trap at the start of the point. By going so high and heavy, opponents step back to let it drop. They step back to a part of the court where offense is basically impossible.

Maja sees them step back, and she moves forward accordingly. If they try to go heavy against her, she moves forward and hits a plethora of drop volleys that opponents have no chance to reach from back in the court.

She baits you. Then she uses deft touch to destroy your legs and lungs.

2) Backhand Slice

It’s a machete. It’s violent and aggressive. She cuts down hard on the ball and creates impressive rotation. Depending on the angle at which she attacks the ball, she can make it go fast and straight like a frozen rope or slow down significantly so the opponent has nothing to work with. The first and second bounce are close together near the baseline.

Maja uses it to cut opponents to pieces. The ball is either way above your strike zone from her forehand or way below your strike zone from her backhand. Good luck with that.

3) Drop Shots

Maja wins the mental battle of shot selection against opponents. She watches everything you do. She sees you lean backward, and that’s the beginning of the end. Her shot selection is incredibly impressive. She reads your balance. She reads your footwork. And then she expertly exploits it.

She hits drop shots with savage backspin. Sometimes the ball goes sideways after barely clearing the net. Opponents try to chase it down, but they are only wearing themselves out. The rich, red Roland Garros clay courts stop her drop shots on a dime.

4) Net Play

Maja plays with incredible touch – especially at the net.

Most of her volleys are touch volleys. Soft volleys hit so opponents who are already pushed well behind the baseline can’t possibly run them down. Maja comes in with heavy lefty forehands that pull opponents off the court. The knock-off volley is the last nail in the coffin. Maja’s volley technique is simple and impressive. She can stick a volley if needed, but most of the time she just takes off power and watches opponents flail, trying to chase it down.

And then there are the potent swinging volleys to quickly get the ball past the opponent.

5) Positive And Calm

Her aura is calm. Her footwork is fast and furious, but her face is always positive and stress-free. She doesn’t get rattled and fixate on her coach’s box, asking for help. She walks confidently from point to point with her racket up. You can tell she is absorbing information from the previous point to use against her opponents on the next point.

She has Roger Federer energy. It’s cool, calm, and collected. She believes, and she does not have to go over the top with her energy all the time. There is no bluff. There is simply a confident assassin plotting the downfall of her latest opponent.

Maja made a believer out of me just watching the warm-up against Carole. Carole didn’t play badly. Maja simply took the match out of her hands.

The practice court is clearly broken. Here’s the proof.

Points are "front loaded". By far the majority of the action, and the winning, takes place in THE FIRST 4 SHOTS. The practice court is full of long rallies. Matches are dominated by short rallies. There is a massive disconnect occurring.

We spend too much time grinding, banging balls up and down the middle of the court – that have no real benefit to winning tennis matches.

There are 3 specific rally lengths in tennis. Here is their percentage breakdown of total points.

0-4 Shots = 70%
5-8 Shots = 20%
9+ Shots = 10%

The First 4 Shots is specifically the serve, return, Serve +1 groundstroke and Return +1 groundstroke. Those are normally the shots that get practiced the least, but matter the most to winning tennis matches.

The net is an extremely high percentage place to be!

If you love playing tennis for fun, spend as much time at the baseline as you like. But if you compete – if the score matters – then you must turn your attention to the net to maximize your potential.

The “herd mentality” in tennis thinks it’s too tough to approach the net in today’s game. The conversation starts with improved string technology, more powerful rackets, and finishes with stronger, faster athletes. The herd think approaching is a relic of the past. The herd is WRONG!

AVERAGE WIN %
Baseline = 46%
Net = 66%

Data from ALL Grand Slams provides the facts about approach and volley, and the data is crystal clear – it’s immensely better than staying back at the baseline, grinding for a living.

The baseline is a tough place to create separation. Here's how to do it.

At the 2012 US Open, only 7 men and 14 women had a winning percentage from the baseline. At Wimbledon 2016, Andy Murray won the title only winning 52% of his baseline points - and he is one of the very best at it in the world!

Num3ers deeply explores the data that rules points, especially from the back of the court. Take a "deep dive" into all three rally lengths (0-4, 5-8, 9+), and winner and errors totals from the elite level of our game. The numbers will shock you!

All 4 Grand Slams

Forcing Errors = 41% Men / 37% Women
Winners = 32% Men / 29% Women
Unforced Errors = 27% Men / 34% Women

Num3ers is very much like putting a jigsaw puzzle together. It's about bringing together different data sets together to create the big picture.

Every recorded match from the 2015 Australian Open - Rd2 to the final.

There is a lot happening on a doubles court. Situations and strategies are constantly being adjusted to create mis-matches with court position. It's hard to keep track of - until now. Dou8les Num3ers is the most comprehensive analysis of doubles data in our sport. The focus is on how a point ends, and it's broken down eight ways to Sunday. Specifically, you find critical information on:

Winners rise to the #1 way a point ends (over forced & unforced errors)

- The last shot of the rally is overwhelmingly struck at the net.
- Center Window: the most important part of a doubles court to control.
- Stephen Huss: an in-depth interview on Wimbledon's Centre Court with the 2005 Wimbledon Doubles Champion.

Dou8les Num3ers leaves no stone unturned. Percentage breakdowns of how often the server or receiver hits the last shot highlight the dramatic influence of the serve. The last shot of the rally is significant, and is broken down into the following categories: volleys, overheads, passing shots, lobs and groundstrokes.

When you play a match, you actually play two matches.

When you walk out onto a tennis court, there are two matches that you are about to play. The first is during the point - a part of the match that you have spent a lot of time preparing for on the practice court. But there is a second match, that takes place in the 20 seconds between the points. This is where the mental and emotional aspects of our sport kick in.

Let's face it, there will be adversity in almost every tennis match that you play. The storm clouds are coming. How bug they are, and how long they last for, are up to you.

Between the points is very tennis specific. It provides a roadmap for the 20 seconds between the points, teaching how to handle the adversity that will surely come, and how to build on the successes that will also be present. Your mind is your biggest asset in a match, and Between the Points takes your hand off the self destruct button and stops you beating yourself.

You don't have to be good at everything, but you have got to be good at something.

You can break tennis down into four key elements - serving, returning, rallying and approaching. Each part has specific patterns of play that consistently deliver higher winning percentages than the others. No more guessing. No more opinions. All facets of our sport are covered in this exceptional product, clearly outlining what patterns to gravitate to, and how to best construct the practice court. Data comes primarily from the 2015 Australian Open.

Building Blocks

MEN = 70% errors / 30% winners
WOMEN = 74% errors / 26% winners

Forcing errors is the best way to construct a point.
You can simply break tennis down into primary and secondary patterns of play - and they are all covered here. Primary patterns include serve and return direction, forehands v backhands, and the best way to approach the net. Secondary patterns include drop shots, serve & volley and 1st volley options. If you play tournaments, this product will greatly help you simplify the singles court.

The conversation starts & ends with the Center Window.

The doubles court is like an hourglass. There are two big ends, but a small neck in the middle where all the action happens. Once you learn the power of the Center Window, where you stand to start the point will take on a lot more significance.

Doubles is a lot more about situations, with four people on the court all "dancing" with one another. Learn all the best doubles patterns, broken down for the server, returner, server's partner and the returner's partner.

Doubles Situations

The "J" - the most ideal movement for the returner's partner to attack the net.

The "V" - a better way of understanding where the server's partner should move to.

Volley Targets - there are four main areas to attack. Know which ones are higher percentage. Beach Volleyball - the idea of a "setter" and "spiker" is ideal for the doubles court.

There are certain parts of the court that the ball travels to a lot, and other low percentage areas that you really don't want to cover at all - like the alley! In general, the serving team wants to keep the ball in the middle of the court as much as possible (to help the server's partner), while the returning team benefits from hitting wider and creating more chaos in the point.