Why Rafael Nadal succeeds on clay?

Rafael Nadal on clay is like a Grand Theft Auto game with the 'Infinite Ammo' cheat code enabled. Several have compared the Spaniard displaying his prowess on the red dirt to Picasso painting a live mural, Ennio Morricone producing a melody exactly congruent with the scenario, or Jorge Lorenzo posting similar times lap after lap in an almost mechanical yet fluid approach.

Rafael Nadal on clay is like a Grand Theft Auto game with the 'Infinite Ammo' cheat code enabled. Several have compared the Spaniard displaying his prowess on the red dirt to Picasso painting a live mural, Ennio Morricone producing a melody exactly congruent with the scenario, or Jorge Lorenzo posting similar times lap after lap in an almost mechanical yet fluid approach.

Rafael Nadal's ability on clay is mostly due to the surface itself. This may appear to be a quip, but the particular qualities of claycourts - which distinguish them from grass and hardcourts - are a fundamental reason why Rafael Nadal has dominated the surface the way he has.

What distinguishes clay? It's sluggish and bouncy. Fundamentally, clay reduces the speed of the ball once it bounces on the surface. Of course, there's more to it than just making the game slow and monotonous, but that's the distinguishing quality of a claycourt.

The surface is also less skiddish than grass or hard, allowing the ball to bounce high, which suits Rafael Nadal's high topspin-based game.

The slick nature of grass and hardcourt surfaces has been one of Rafael Nadal's main challenges throughout his career. Because there is significantly more skid on the ball on grass and hard than on clay, the ball tends to stay low. That in turn takes away vital time from the Spaniard to apply enough topspin.

For many of Rafael Nadal's career, his allegedly subpar serve in compared to his opponents was regarded as his most serious flaw. When his ground game isn't functioning, Nadal rarely has the luxury of a great first serve that can bail him out of trouble. To save break points, the 19-time Grand Slam champion frequently needs to drag out rallies.

Despite having a somewhat weak serve for the majority of his career, Rafael Nadal has able to take use of his southpaw serve on the ad side (to a right-handed opponent's normally weaker side). And nowhere has he done it better than on his favourite red dirt; just ask Roger Federer how much it sucks for the opponent.

The southpaw's serve forces the right-handed returner wide into his backhand corner, resulting in a weak return. This opens up practically the entire court for Rafael Nadal to unleash his most lethal weapon, the forehand down the line.

Rafael Nadal's obsession with patterns has been a feature of his game throughout his career, regardless of the surface.

In fact, because he is preoccupied on keeping to his rallying patterns, Nadal sometimes lets go of an opening and misses a chance to strike a winner into the open court. On social media, this has become known as Nadal's "Open Court atheism."