Tereza Valentova arrived in Rome at 9:00 p.m. local time on Tuesday, went straight into a tournament week built around graduation exams, and still won her Internazionali BNL d'Italia debut on Wednesday. She beat Yulia Putintseva 6-3, 6-2 to reach the second round and set up a matchup with Coco Gauff on Thursday.
Valentova said the trip had been “a little bit chaotic” because she got in so late and was still doing exams for her high school graduation. She stopped in Prague on Monday to complete one of them, part of the three tests required for her Czech secondary school diploma. “I didn't plan to play this tournament because -- we didn't know. I was like '[I have] nothing to lose, just I'm going to play and enjoy that I get to here and play a match,'” she said.
The result carried real weight because Valentova has been trying to balance schoolwork with a climb that has taken her from outside the top 175 this time last season into the top 50 in the PIF WTA Rankings. Her run through the spring has already included the final at the L'Open 35 de Saint Malo WTA 125 event in France on Sunday, leaving little time to prepare for Rome before she faced Putintseva.
What comes next is tougher. Valentova has passed two of the three exams for her Czech secondary school diploma, with Czech literature, English and economics still defining the academic side of the week. On court, she will face Gauff, who beat her in the second round of Roland Garros last year. Valentova did not hide the scale of the challenge. “It's so difficult,” she said, before adding that she would try to play with an open mind and “do 100%” on her side. For a teenager racing between school and the main draw in Rome, that may be the clearest sign yet that her season has reached a new level.
