It was a strange day for Rafa, who managed to go out without much of a fight and win a championship in the same day.

Huh?

The loss to Kolya was far from suprising and far from enjoyable. Rafa was clearly ailing and by the end of the first set, he was out of steam. By the second set, he was barely moving. The snarl was anywhere but his face, which looked closer to a sick puppy than a bulldog.

Then he came out and won the doubles title. To be fair, the 10% of the time Rafa squared up the ball against Kolya, he was able to hit it well. Obviously there’s a lot less running around in doubles and that combined with no ad scoring must have helped.

There you have it. Rafa’s first title of 2011: Doha doubles champion.

Elsewhere, Fed was all business against Jo. Fed has been cruising all week and has been clutch in tiebreaks as per usual. He’ll be in tough against The Fuzzy Koala in the final however, and I think it will be a good test to find out exactly where he is.