LADYDRAGON.COM - Bob and Mike Bryan win their fifth Australia Open doubles title defeating Mahesh Bupathi and Leader Paes 6-3 6-4

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Sunday January 30, 2011

Bob and Mike Bryan win their fifth Australia Open doubles title defeating Mahesh Bupathi and Leader Paes 6-3 6-4.

By LadyDragon

Australian Open 2011

MELBOURNE, Australia--(LadyDragon.com)30/01/11--Bob and Mike Bryan win their fifth Australia Open doubles title defeating Mahesh Bupathi and Leader Paes 6-3 6-4.

Q. Your fifth Australian Open doubles title. As sweet as the first one?

BOB BRYAN: It definitely is. It never gets old. Especially to play those two guys, you know, the Indian Express, who we have tons of respect for.

We were jacked up for this match. These two guys are legends. It was an extra special feeling out there on the court, you know, playing two guys that have dominated the game 10 years ago. We're happy to have them back. It's good for doubles. Good to have another marquee team out there. They're only going to make what we do more popular.

Q. They talked about how your serve was the main difference. Would you agree?

MIKE BRYAN: Yeah. We served a high percentage. If Mahesh was right, we served 83%. That first game was huge. We were down Love 40. That set the tone of the match. If we got broken there, could have been a different story.

Bob especially served well. Did you have nine aces? You served Mahesh really tough, and Mahesh is a great returner. He kind of just took him out of the match.

I served a high percentage, too. We weren't down a breakpoint after that until the last game, which kind of made things easier for us. So it always starts with serving for us. If we serve well, that's our game.

Q. Bob, on the breakpoint of the last game, were you thinking an ace down the T?

BOB BRYAN: Yeah, I'd been hitting that spot. It was amazing. Felt like I could drive a truck right down the T. It was wild to see it that big. Like Mike said, Mahesh, you have to serve well. You have to go for your spots.

I said to Mike, I'm going for the ace. He said to me, Yeah, he can't hit what he can't see. I just went for it and made it (laughter).

Q. They said you played perfect. Was it close to perfect?

BOB BRYAN: Yeah, I mean, we made a couple errors here and there, but we were doing what we wanted to do. We made the errors on shots, on aggressive shots. I just felt like we had the right mentality from the get go, which is serve them big, hopefully take Mahesh out of it.

Their play is Mahesh returning low and Leander climbing all over you at the net. We kind of took that play out of their game plan, which was the key.

Q. They have a reputation of talking on the court, trying to put their opponents off. Was there much chatter on the court?

MIKE BRYAN: No, it was kind of a calm match. You know, we've had a lot of battles with both those guys. Their strength is their energy and their feistiness.

As you saw, the last couple weeks they had a few confrontations with players, as did we. It was kind of the perfect storm. Two feisty teams getting together.

Maybe if it would have gone three sets or got a little closer, it could have. But I don't think they chest pumped. We only threw in one. I thought it was going to be a chest pumping war out there.

But, yeah, they're great for doubles. It's just great to have the Indian Express back on the doubles court.

Q. Did you want to throw a couple vamoses in there?

BOB BRYAN: We've been known to do that. We have that in our bag of tricks. That was Plan B.

Q. What is it about this tournament? This is five here. Why is this slam the one that works so well for you?

MIKE BRYAN: We always come in here fresh and healthy. We play kind of an arduous schedule. Like we're going down to Brazil in a week to play Costa do Sauipe. So we play nasty schedule. Sometimes we get worn down by the middle of the year.

But we always come in in here happy, fresh. We're always comfortable. This is a great slam. It's so convenient, staying five minutes into the city. We love the hotel. We love the food. I don't know. It's hard court, too. This is where we feel most comfortable, the surface.

BOB BRYAN: Yeah, it's a little bit slower than the US Open. So I feel like I can return, but still quick enough where we can serve big. Yeah, we've also gotten a lot of luck over the years, you know.

Like first round against Rajeev and Lipsky. Mike was serving 4 All, Love 30, second serve. I just went blind poach. Take that point away, and we're out in the first round. Let cord winner tonight, but also at 6 4 in the second set against Melzer Petzschner. We were down a couple set points.

MIKE BRYAN: Lob winner and a let cord. You don't win those points and we're already home now.

Yeah, a lot of stuff has to go right over the two weeks.

Q. Do you get nervous at all in finals?

BOB BRYAN: It's getting better.

MIKE BRYAN: The stomach used to get pretty bad. Couldn't eat. Now it's getting a little better. Tonight I felt the loosest I have in any slam. I felt pretty good coming in.

You know, we had like 54 hours to think about it from our last match. So sometimes you're playing tricks in your own head. I thought we were calm.

BOB BRYAN: It gets easier and easier. This is our 18th Grand Slam final. I think it's gotten gradually easier every one. Used to be a tortuous experience. Didn't get a wink of sleep for the first 10 probably, the night before. Last night I slept like a baby.

So, yeah, we're going out there and we're playing it not like any other match, because there's definitely a lot more on the line but it feels like we can relax like any other match.

Q. So ten is a big number.

MIKE BRYAN: It's nice to hit double digits.

BOB BRYAN: Creeping up on the Woodies.

Q. What motivates you to keep going?

MIKE BRYAN: That number. Their 11 Grand Slams. That's motivating us.

BOB BRYAN: They're big heroes of ours. We always exchange banter in the locker rooms. Mark Woodforde actually said, Hey, guys, we'll be watching. Almost to put a little bit of fear in us or make us nervous. And then he said, Yeah, probably won't help, though.

So I think he probably wants us to go down. Yeah, I mean, we'll hopefully stay healthy and tag that record.

Q. Have you ever seen tapes of McEnroe and Fleming play?

BOB BRYAN: Have you?

MIKE BRYAN: I've actually never seen any tapes of them playing. Where did you see it?

BOB BRYAN: During a rain delay maybe at Wimbledon.

MIKE BRYAN: No. I mean, we've played Mack in a couple of exhibitions. He's pretty sick at doubles. He sees all the angles. I mean, his feel is crazy. His serve.

I think Fleming was just the solid guy, right? Big serve?

Q. Yeah. Serve volleyed pretty well. If there was a historically good team never played that you might have wanted to match up against.

BOB BRYAN: Mack and Fleming, lefty, righty team. Mack was No. 1 in doubles for 270 weeks, which was pretty amazing, because he was doing that during his singles. You wouldn't see that today. There's no way. Two different sports.

Q. In the individual rankings, Bob, you're 1, Mike, you're 2. You're twins.

BOB BRYAN: That's a typo.

MIKE BRYAN: I think we're T 1. We have exactly the same amount of tournaments. He's probably just on top. It's alphabetical.

DANIEL NESTOR: I don't know. Wozniak or Marino.