“In 90% of matches, you win before you even step onto the court.” Simona Halep tells us on the latest BT Talks podcast.

If you’ve ever wondered what a champion’s mindset looks like, grab your 🎧 headphones. In the new episode, we talk about discipline, determination and a winning mindset with Simona Halep and Andi Moisescu, the host of our podcast.

Show notes:

03:04 - About the confidence Simona’s father had in her

07:28 - Role models in sport

10:36 - Simona’s advice for parents

13:24 - Confidence, a winning mindset and the Wimbledon title

19:24 - What it means to invest in yourself

20:54 - Isolating herself from anything that could have affected her career

24:34 - Our limits aren’t fixed

31:10 - What’s next

We’ve picked a few highlights, but hit play:

• Performance isn’t a secret. You need to put in the work and figure out what you got wrong so you can do better next time. When you succeed, you forget both the hardship and the weight of the years.

• In 90% of cases, the match is won before it starts. High‑stakes, emotional Grand Slam finals are won and lost beforehand.

• It’s not easy to make friends with stress. Darren Cahill taught Simona to see the big picture and to stop putting pressure on the moment so she could focus. “When you put too much pressure on yourself, you freeze and can’t focus anymore.”

• Our limit isn’t fixed. When you want more and more, you can make that limit flexible. “I feel tired, these have been tough years, but I can still play for 2-3 more years.”

• Simona has always invested in herself and doubled down on what could help her in the long run: a better coach, better training. And she learned to take the best from every moment and from every person who came into her life.

• Over the last 6 years, Simona has been in complete lockdown. She isolated herself from anything that could have affected her career and performance, including interviews or TV appearances. That lockdown helped her become world No. 1.

• Justine Henin, Rafael Nadal, Andrei Pavel, Gheorghe Hagi and Cristian Chivu are role models who have helped Simona in her career.

• Rafael Nadal is Simona’s model for his attitude to the game. He plays every point as if it were the last of his life. Only after 3-4 years of training with Darren did Simona develop a mindset similar to Nadal’s.

We’re also releasing the first documentary about Simona this year, so #staytuned. You can hear a few insights about the documentary in the podcast with director Radu Muntean.

We’ll be back soon with more BT Talks episodes. Subscribe on one of the podcast platforms Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or Spotify so you don’t miss a single episode.