The Spaniard is one of the favorites for the Indian Wells title
Carlos Alcaraz has declared he is fit and ready for the Indian Wells Masters and has played down any injury concerns.
The 19-year-old withdrew last week from Acapulco with a hamstring injury he picked during his Rio Open final defeat to Cameron Norrie on 26 February.
The world No.2, however, made a swift recovery and finds himself in the main draw for Indian Wells Masters, which he will be aiming to win to add to his collection of 2 ATP Masters titles.
“I’m feeling really good right now,” he said at the tournament’s media day.
“Today was the first practice that I practised with some players, played some points.”
“I feel great. I took some days off and it was really good for me. Right now I’m ready.”
Alcaraz is red-hot favorite to win the title after the withdrawel of star players Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal. Should he win, he would leapfrog Djokovic as World No.1 in the ATP rankings and that acts as an extra stimulation for the young Spaniard.
Alcaraz, however, plays down talks of him being the favorite, based on his lack of wins on hard courts ever since lifting the 2022 US Open trophy.
“I don’t consider myself a favourite to win the tournament because it has been a long time since I played on hard court.” he said
“Of course there are a lot of great players in this draw that have chances to win the tournament.”
“I would say that I have my chances to win the tournament and I’m going to [try to] take it.”