Auger-Aliassime balances bliss and bids in Shanghai
Fresh from a Marrakech wedding, Felix Auger-Aliassime returns to the tour with Nina at his side, channeling marital harmony into a fierce push for the Nitto ATP Finals amid Shanghai’s pulsing lights.
Under Shanghai‘s neon glow, Felix Auger-Aliassime steps onto the hard courts, the echo of wedding bells fading into the sharp crack of ball on string. Two weeks after tying the knot in Morocco, the Canadian arrives at the Shanghai Masters, where personal joy intersects with professional hunger. With his new wife Nina joining him courtside, he jokes about their shared adventure, turning the road’s grind into something intimate amid the tournament’s electric hum.
Wedding vows echo on the baseline
The ceremony unfolded flawlessly at the Selman Marrakech hotel, drawing 120 guests to celebrate in the Moroccan landscape tied to Nina’s family roots. Felix proposed during a Seychelles getaway in November 2024, and on September 20, 2025, their union became reality, horses weaving through the festivities as a nod to her equestrian passion—guests toasting with sunset cocktails near the stables. He recalls the night’s pinnacle in the speeches from family, voices unveiling raw emotion in a way daily life rarely allows.
“Everything was so positive… a lot of things could go wrong in a wedding, but it went beautifully well and the highlight of the night was probably the speeches,” he shares, the memory sharpening his focus on these Plexicushion courts. Nina’s grasp of his nomadic sacrifices, shaped by her father’s athletic life, bridges their worlds, even as he teases the differences: tennis demands he run, not ride, yet both crave technical precision where margins are razor-thin.
“Honeymoon? This is our honeymoon, a Shanghai honeymoon,” the Canadian joked to ATPTour.com in China this week, where he is joined by wife Nina.
“We’re here together and maybe later in the year there’s going to be a honeymoon. But for now, obviously I have to get back to the tournaments, get back to work… but we’re still having a good time together.”
“There’s always a part during the dinner where family and friends will give speeches and myself, my mom, Nina’s sister, her dad, they all gave speeches and it was the most beautiful and touching moment because you don’t get to speak like that to each other often or there’s not really the circumstances to speak in such a deep way. So that was really the highlight for us.”
“She’s understood my world from the beginning and that’s helped our relationship because she understood the sacrifices of my life on the road,” Felix said. “She saw her dad, his whole life being an equestrian athlete, go through that similar type of sacrifice.
“But our sports are very different. We always laugh when I tell her: ‘I don’t make the horse run, I run myself’. But I think there are similarities in how technically sound you have to be in both sports. Tennis is a very technical sport and the margins in equestrian and show jumping are very small. So you also need to be very, very clean technically.”
A love that never stopped growing from the moment we laid eyes on each other, and never will September 20th, 2025, our dreams became reality. Photos: Rani Fawaz Tuxedo: @Dior Wedding gown: @VeraWang Venue: @SelmanMarrakech
A love that never stopped growing from the moment we laid eyes on each other, and never will
September 20th, 2025, our dreams became reality.
Photos: Rani Fawaz
Tuxedo: @Dior
Wedding gown: @VeraWang
Venue: @SelmanMarrakech pic.twitter.com/s2jywsCE8D— Félix AugerAliassime (@felixtennis) September 25, 2025
Season’s dips test resilient spirit
At 10th in the PIF ATP Live Race to Turin, Felix Auger-Aliassime hovers one spot shy of the eight-man field for the Nitto ATP Finals, aided by Jack Draper‘s season-ending injury. His 34-19 record this year echoes the breakout 2022 campaign with 60 wins that secured his debut there, and one victory here pushes him to 250 career triumphs. Early fire lit the season: titles in Adelaide and Montpellier within the first five weeks, plus a Dubai final reclaiming Top 20 status, his aggressive style thriving on hard courts with inside-out forehands pinning opponents deep.
Spring shadows fell, though, with just one win across four ATP Masters 1000 events leading to Roland Garros, where Matteo Arnaldi edged him in a five-set opener on clay. Doubts infiltrated his game plan, hesitation on slower surfaces clashing with his power instincts—he overthought patterns, opting for conservative slices over penetrating down-the-line shots. The mental toll mounted, confidence ebbing amid the red clay’s drag, until subtle tweaks restored rhythm: a refined serve with higher kick and tactical trust in one–two combinations.
Summer’s surge followed, a quarter-final at the Cincinnati Open blending underspin backhands with flat drives to control tempo, though Jannik Sinner overwhelmed him 6-2, 6-0. Momentum peaked at the US Open, a semi-final run culminating in a gritty 6-1, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 loss to the world No. 1, where heavy groundstrokes varied depths to disrupt rhythm, his improved serve holding in pressure games.
“They weren’t big changes I made, just a few things to adjust. I mean technically, I think my serve has improved throughout the year and then also tactically I was more aware,” he explained. “I think I was not playing the right way on the clay or I was not really trusting my game plan always or I was doubting myself too much. But then I got back on the hard courts again, and while it wasn’t perfect, I was improving, improving, improving until the great US Open. So hopefully I can keep that going.”
“It was a physical battle with both of us struggling at times, mentally as well to show the least weakness to your opponent. He came out on top. But for me, it was encouraging to see a better level for me, playing the No. 1 in the world at the time, playing him. He’s been on a hot streak for a while, so it was definitely encouraging.”
Turin push fuels late autumn fire
With four of his seven titles claimed in October—including a 2022 hat-trick in Florence, Antwerp, and Basel, defended the next year—the Canadian eyes closing the 630-point gap to eighth-placed Lorenzo Musetti, whose home-soil motivation adds stakes. Hard courts amplify his strengths, the bounce suiting flat-hitting forehands for crosscourt angles and low-trajectory serves exploiting quick points, a far cry from clay’s topspin loops that once sapped penetration. Nina’s presence anchors him, her insight into isolation softening Shanghai’s humid nights as crowds swell along the Huangpu.
Opening Saturday against Alejandro Tabilo, he faces a lefty whose topspin forehand tests returns, but his speed and right-handed blasts can redirect rallies inside-out, forcing errors with deep crosscourts and down-the-line backhands. Deeper runs here could vault points, the math tilting with Draper’s absence—Shanghai, Basel, Paris offering paths to displace rivals. “I’m extremely motivated [to qualify],” he declares. “I started the year very strong and then for a couple months it was more difficult in the spring, but I had a great summer in America. There’s always ups and downs, but it’s been a positive year so far. So if I can make one last push in the next month to secure my place in Turin, that would be beautiful. But I’m not in it right now, so I need to push some guys out. I need to really play some good tennis and get a lot of wins.”
In this neon-lit arena, where lights cast long shadows and the air hums with anticipation, he channels wedding glow into every stroke, the one–two punch of serve and forehand slicing through doubt. Turin’s allure beckons, a second taste within grasp if he sustains the evolution—trusting aggression over hesitation, point by calculated point, as partnership fuels the final surge.
