Like tennis players the world over, David Wagner found himself grounded by the global response to Covid. From March until September, he spent his days at his base at the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center on the outskirts of San Diego – the longest spell he has spent in one place for 18 years.

Beyond the masks, disinfectant and social distancing, the monastic day-to-day routine changed little for the 46-year-old from the out-of-competition life he lives between tournaments.

“A typical day would be: get up, walk over to the courts and do my tennis workout; grab some breakfast then rest a little bit; go back to the courts, probably get a gym workout in; at some point, lunch; by 4pm or 5pm every day I’m pretty much done, unless I take a night session under the lights, which I do a couple of times a week. Dinner, pop in the room and relax – then sleep, wake up and repeat.”

It may sound a little spartan, but there are worse places for an athlete to find themselves stranded during a pandemic than a multi-disciplinary sporting campus. Wagner, one of between 65 and 100 on-site residents, typically finds himself surrounded by rugby squads, rowing crews, lacrosse teams and BMXers, even lifting weights next to Olympic champion shot-putters. “When he’s saying, ‘Come on Wags, push that weight!’ I can't let this guy down,” he says with a chuckle.

“That's life out here at the training center. It's like that for everybody, not just me. The track and field guys are doing the exact same thing every single day: wake up, eat breakfast, walk down to their venue and start working out. It's like their full-time jobs and they all treat it that way. It’s fun to be in that environment.”

'Robin and I had a running joke about who was going to win more Masters titles back in the day - we had a deal where whoever won had to buy the other a case of beer!'

Wagner’s tennis CV is, put simply, the stuff of legend. For almost two decades he has been a fixture at the upper reaches of the UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour quad rankings that he first topped in 2003, and the sharp end of the majors. As well as his 24 Grand Slam titles – six in singles, 18 in doubles – he has eight Paralympic medals to his name: three gold, three silver and two bronze. Were it not for the pandemic, he would currently be in Orlando seeking a 12^th NEC Masters Singles crown; only Esther Vergeer, with 14, has more.

While wheelchair tennis introduced the Masters as a season finale for the year’s top-ranked players in 1994, the quad division – for players whose disability results in impairment in their upper limbs as well as at least one of their lower limbs – was added alongside the men’s and women’s divisions in 2004. Wagner won the inaugural singles title that year; in 2019 he won No.11.

Asked for the secret behind his Masters success – he also has 11 UNIQLO Masters Doubles titles, each won with compatriot Nick Taylor – Wagner is frank: “I have to be honest with you, I really don't know. I've enjoyed what it stands for and what it was about – we had the Masters before Grand Slams. And it's always been one of the toughest tournaments, because of the round robin style. I think too just knowing that it was really important that the quad division was included in it, and we eventually got into it. I didn't want to miss that opportunity.

“The first ones, back in Amersfoort, that was nostalgic – that was where the Masters was formed, and it was cool to be on the courts with greats like David Hall, Esther Vergeer, and Robin Ammerlaan. Robin and I had a running joke about who was going to win more Masters titles back in the day, and we had a deal where whoever won had to buy the other a case of beer!

“When the United States first took it on in Mission Viejo and ran it outdoors in 2013, that was awesome. And now it has come back to the United States in Orlando, at the National Campus. You’ve got all those courts, and people who really know tennis.”

'I love the sport, I love competing, I love training. I feel like I'm competitive with the young guys, and as long as I'm still at that level, I’ll continue to play'

Those whose exposure to wheelchair tennis is limited to the Grand Slams could be forgiven for thinking that the quad division was a remarkably small group of players. Since 2019, all four majors now host quad singles and doubles draws, each with a four-player field – the world’s top three and a wild card. In contrast, the Masters invites six quad players to compete in singles, and four pairs in doubles. Over the years, Wagner has faced nine different opponents in his singles finals.

“It definitely shows the depth within our division, when you see it that way,” Wagner said. “That shows you the talent is there to probably increase our draws to full capacity. With the Slams being only four [quad] players right now, it really limits who you're going to see there. The ultimate goal would be to increase those draws.”

While Wagner would much rather have spent 2020 on tour and playing in his fifth Paralympic Games, there were positives to be taken from the enforced hiatus. With one eye on Tokyo 2020, he admits his comeback from hernia surgery in 2019 was perhaps too hasty, and the break gave him time to let his body rest and recover without the threat of a slide down the rankings.

“I looked at it as an opportunity, as an older athlete – no time zone changes, no long gruelling matches, no nagging injuries,” he said. “It may prolong my career a little bit, so I can actually continue playing at a higher level.”

'It's bigger than trying to win a tournament or win a medal; it's showing what a person with my type of disability can still do'

Even at 46, Wagner is not ready to slow down. For as long as he can remember, people have asked him how long he intends to keep playing, and the answer hasn't changed.

“I don't look at it as the end is coming anytime soon,” he insists. “I'm healthy again – the break is just what my body needed – and I love the sport, I love competing, I love training. I feel like I'm competitive with the young guys, and as long as I'm still at that level, enjoying it, and competitive, I’ll continue to play.

“But as with anything, it's going to come to an end at some point – and that's okay. I'll be ready for that time when it comes, and hopefully something will be there for me.”

There’s always been more to Wagner’s career than competition, though he admits he hates losing more than he loves winning: “The feeling of winning is phenomenal – I mean, that's what you're there to try and do – but I think what impacts me more is the loss. I do hate losing, probably more than a normal person hates it.”

What motivates him most of all, however, is building on the legacies of those athletes who set the foundations for wheelchair tennis to become the sport it is today and improving it for future generations.

“I feel like there's still a lot to accomplish within our division, particularly in terms of equality,” he said. “Keeping the division equal, keeping it growing, keeping the ability to show quadriplegics playing tennis. Being part of that is something I wanted from the moment I started. It's bigger than trying to win a tournament or win a medal or whatnot; it's showing what a person with my type of disability can still do. I still feel like I want to be part of that, because it's bigger than me. It's a lot more than just winning and losing.”

As a role model, Wagner has certainly played his part in amplifying the message of wheelchair tennis. He is a regular at wheelchair tennis clinics, where his eyes were opened to another strand of the equation that could accelerate the growth of the sport. “It’s about getting more and more people involved – getting kids involved, new injuries involved, people that played back in the day to start again and keeping them involved.

“But it’s funny – the people that I do the camps with are the same people that I learned wheelchair tennis from,” he adds. “I would love to see more coaches for wheelchair tennis around the world. More knowledge, different strategies and different techniques is going to make a huge difference.

“I'd love to coach or get into helping other players some day. But for the meantime, it's full-go for me: fully committed to training and competing when tournaments start back up, and getting back into the grind of it.”