Coco Gauff Opens Up About Striving for Perfectionism to Vogue: ‘Life is Never This Serious’

Coco Gauff shines gold as FashionApril cover star. In addition to starring in the duvet story shot by Annie Leibovitz, Gauff also talks about life since winning her first Grand Slam and striving for perfection.

“It’s a great thing, but it’s also a bad thing,” she told the newspaper about her constant pursuit of perfectionism. Sometimes a tennis champion has to remind herself to speak kindly to herself, even when she fails.

“It’s not like I’m saying, ‘Good job, Coco.’ It’s like, “Okay, why didn’t you do this sooner?” she said.

As Gauff approaches her twentieth birthday on March 13, she’s trying to show herself more grace and compassion.

“I’m trying to, you know, accept good takes more often and give myself as many compliments as criticism.”

Even as a self-proclaimed perfectionist, Gauff admits that perfection is unimaginable to achieve.

“Theoretically, you’re always striving for more because you’ll never be perfect,” she explained. “The day I play every match, score every point and make no mistakes, I will achieve perfection. Which will never happen.”

Gauff’s recent trainer, Brad Gilbert, has helped her achieve recent victories, in addition to gain strength and let go of things that are not “that serious.”

“​He’s a great guy with a lot of knowledge, but when you meet him, all of a sudden he’ll crack a joke or say something funny,” she said. “You’re clearly pissed and you had a bad practice, and he says something and you’re not pissed anymore.”

She added: “Life is never that serious, at the least not on the tennis court. Things are never that serious on the tennis court. I feel I just learned that from watching him.

Gilbert entered just over a month before the US Open, which Gauff later won. Winning the US Open in September put Gauff in a “euphoric” mood that she suspects she is going to struggle with for the remaining of her life.

“It was a feeling I will never be able to recreate, no matter how many more games I win,” she said. “I want to win more to be as close to this feeling as possible. I told my mom – I literally said, “It was an addictive feeling.” As soon as I felt it, I wanted to feel it again.”

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Before the beginning of the 2024 season, she scored one other victory – Gauff had some much-needed rest along with her family and boyfriend. Without revealing her lover’s name, she said: “He is a really nice guy. He’s at college now. He intends to apply for admission to a music school. He wants to grow to be an actor and plays the guitar. He’s not from Delray. He’s actually from Atlanta.

“She admitted that some internet sleuths may or may not have found his identity and shared it on X, formerly Twitter. “I won’t answer and confirm whether it’s him or not,” she said shyly.

Gauff will next face women’s singles players at a tournament in Indian Wells later this week.