The Longest Final in History: Five Charts on Alcaraz’s Victory

It was a historic final: 5 hours and 29 minutes of long and closely matched exchanges. Never before had it taken so long to win Roland Garros. Carlos Alcaraz triumphed over Jannik Sinner in five sets to secure his second title in Paris and join the elite group of tennis players who have been crowned more than once on the Parisian clay.

We review with graphics some of the keys that will make yesterday’s final unforgettable.

Reviving when you only have a 1% chance

The match was a war with multiple battles swinging back and forth. For much of the time, the probable winner seemed clear: Sinner. That was what the forecasters at Polymarket, a platform where thousands of users make real-time predictions, indicated.

It can be seen in the graph. At 19:12, the Italian was serving with three match points in his favor. At that moment, his probability of victory reached 99%. Alcaraz was on the ropes, with barely a 1 in 100 chance.

But Alcaraz came back. The Murcian saved that game and achieved a break in the next one. He went from 1% to 50% chance when he forced the fifth set. He even led at 5-3, with an 80% chance at that moment. But then there was another twist: Sinner reacted, took the lead, and had the match on his side. In the end, they went to a tie-break. According to the forecasters, Alcaraz and Sinner started it at a 50% chance—nullifying five hours of tremendous effort—but the Spaniard quickly gained the advantage and ended up victorious.

The longest final of the Open era

The 329 minutes of the Alcaraz-Sinner final shatter the previous record, according to TennisAbstract. They exceed the longest final of Roland Garros in the Open era by 47 minutes: the 282 minutes that Swedish player Mats Wilander needed to defeat Argentine Guillermo Vilas in 1982.

The record nearly doubles the average duration of Paris finals, which in the Open era hovers around three hours. It also quintupled the shortest—those from 1970, 1973, and 1975—that barely reached an hour and a half.

Sunday’s match was also the final with the most games played: 59 rounds if we count the three tie-breaks. That’s eight games more than Ivan Lendl and John McEnroe in 1984, and ten more than Novak Djokovic and Stefanos Tsitsipas in 2021.

These were also long games. They likely exceeded 2,000 shots. Pending definitive data, this is probably the final with the most exchanges in the history of the tournament.

The end of an era

Alcaraz won his first Grand Slam in New York 2022, but it is since 2024 that the new generation has definitively solidified. Between Alcaraz and Sinner, they now have six consecutive Grand Slams. The old guard has passed the baton: Federer and Nadal are retired, and Djokovic hasn’t won a major since 2023.

It’s a historic change. From 2004 to 2023, the ‘Big Three’ won 65 of the 79 Grand Slams played—an 82% dominance. Now, that hegemony has ended.

Will they reach the success of the ‘Big Three’?

The new generation has a long way to go. The numbers of Djokovic (24 Grand Slams), Nadal (22), and Federer (20) seem from another galaxy compared to the five of Alcaraz and the three of Sinner.

But they barely exceed twenty. At Alcaraz’s age (21 years), Nadal also had five Grand Slams, while Djokovic and Federer were still seeking their first. In fact, in a twist of fate, Alcaraz secured his fifth title this Sunday at exactly the same age Nadal won his.

For Sinner and Alcaraz, the first step is to challenge stars like Pete Sampras (14 majors), Roy Emerson (12), or Björn Borg (11).

Meanwhile, three women match the three greats of men’s tennis, each in their time: Margaret Court achieved 24 majors in the sixties and seventies, Steffi Graf 22 in the eighties and nineties, and Serena Williams 23 in the two thousands.