Over the past three months, Jannik Sinner has been stacking up milestones and rewriting records almost every time he steps on court. Competing in Italy, he recently extended his run to 32 consecutive Masters 1000 wins: another big number added to an already heavy workload.

But with all that success has come clear fatigue. After pushing his body through such an intense streak, even the World No. 1 finally showed signs that he needed a brief pause, at least for a moment.

After his quarter-final win over Andrey Rublev at the Italian Open, Jannik Sinner walked off court having just added another milestone to his run, but the exhaustion was obvious almost immediately. During the post-match interview with Sky Sports, he leaned against a wall just to stay upright.

Interviewer Laura Robson quickly picked up on it and said, “You’re leaning against the wall, it looks like the legs are tired, so I’ll let you go,” before wrapping things up. Sinner thanked her, but as he turned away, he doubled over briefly, holding his legs as he struggled to stay on his feet.

Sinner’s 6-2, 6-4 win over Andrey Rublev in the Italian Open quarter-finals took him over the top of Novak Djokovic’s 31 consecutive Masters 1000 titles, which he had chalked up from Indian Wells through to the Cincinnati final in 2011. Sinner’s run of form started at the Rolex Paris Masters in November 2025, where he defeated Zizou Bergs in the second round and went on to claim the title. The rest was history with a run of dominance that was unparalleled on the Masters circuit. 

Since his retirement in Shanghai in October 2025, Sinner has picked up trophies in Paris, Indian Wells, Miami, Monte Carlo, and Madrid and is the first player in history to win five consecutive Masters 1000 events. The sheer weight of that run becomes clearer in the context of sets dropped.

Sinner won a record 37 sets, starting from his second-round victory in Paris and finishing with his victory in Miami’s third round. He has lost only two sets in 27 straight wins, starting with his Indian Wells first-round win in March. And here in Rome, he has not lost a single set in four games, having defeated Sebastian Ofner, Alexei Popyrin, Andrea Pellegrino and even Rublev in straight sets. By defeating Rublev on Thursday, Sinner extended his consecutive set streak to 20 in a row, dating back to his first-round match in Madrid. 

“I don’t play for records, I play just for my own story. In the same time, it means a lot,” Sinner said after entering the history books.

He had come to Rome having won nearly every tennis game since the fall, with a record of 27 wins in 68 days, an average of one win every 2.5 days. 

He broke serve immediately, as he has in each of his four matches this week. But against Rublev, leading by a set and a double-break, the wheels briefly wobbled. Rublev broke back late in the second set, the first time Sinner had dropped serve all tournament. In the second set, his first serve percentage dropped to 39% (12/31), and he was seen grabbing his thigh after one game. He came through, but not without a warning. 

Sinner’s right thigh hasn’t been a concern for the first time this season. In October 2025, he lost his last Masters match in Shanghai, retiring with a cramp in the same leg while trailing 6-7(3), 7-5, 3-2 in a very humid environment. On that occasion, Sinner was cramping so badly he could hardly stand up straight, and a physio had to help him walk to his chair. 

That was echoed in the post-match scenes on Thursday. The difference, this time, was that Sinner had already served out the match. He was through to the semi-finals, but clearly running on empty. 

“Every day is different, every match is different, every opponent is different. We try to prepare in the best possible way tactically, which today worked well. He managed to break in the second set, which complicated, a bit, the things. But in the same time, I was always up with the score, I tried to stay as calm as I could,” he told Robson before she cut it short.

His priority heading into Friday’s semi-final, he made clear, was straightforward: “The highest priority is trying to recover as much as I can physically.”

What is still at stake?

Even if it’s tiring, Sinner’s situation here is unparalleled. He’s won all Masters 1000 events except the Italian Open. A title on Sunday would make him only the second man in history, after Djokovic, to complete the Career Golden Masters, winning all nine Masters events.

The last Italian to hoist the singles trophy at the Foro Italico was Adriano Panatta in 1976, who will be handing it over to this year’s champion, while Italy’s President Sergio Mattarella will also be present at the final. 

Between Sinner and that history is a semi-final between Daniil Medvedev or Martin Landaluce. He has also dropped just two sets across his last 62 Masters matches, and on clay in 2026, he has yet to lose one.

“It’s normal that one day in the tournament you are slightly tired,” Sinner said of his dip in the second set. “I played a lot also. It has been very long days for me. But I’m happy how I ended the situation.”

A wall was enough to hold him up on Thursday evening. Two more wins in Rome, and he will not need one.