Yahoo Sports Doubles 'dating' & reindeer stew fuel Patten success
Australian Open 2025
Dates: 12-26 January Venue: Melbourne Park
Coverage: Live radio commentary on Tennis Breakfast from 07:00 GMT on BBC 5 Sports Extra, plus live text commentaries on the BBC Sport website and app
As many life partners can testify, a successful relationship is not necessarily built on instant attraction.
It turns out it can be the same for doubles partners in tennis.
Britain's Henry Patten is thankful his Finnish playing partner Harri Heliovaara had a change of heart after initial misgivings.
"To put it in dating terms, we weren't particularly happy about how our relationships were going in the doubles world at the start of last year," Patten, who became the British number one in doubles last year, told BBC Sport.
"We were in Acapulco and started to discuss maybe playing together. Harri initially said no.
"Then I think he had one bad result too many and said 'screw it, let's just do it'."
The rewards since they took the plunge have been staggering.
At their first tournament together, the pair won an ATP title in Marrakech and the success kept coming - with the Wimbledon men's doubles title the pinnacle.
Nine months after linking up, Patten and Heliovaara have started the new 2025 season as one of the leading teams in the world.
They are seeded sixth at the Australian Open, where they beat India's Rithvik Bollipalli and Ryan Seggerman of the United States to set up a second-round meeting on Friday with Australians Matthew Romios and Marc Polmans.
Complementing styles of play – Patten's power dovetailing with Heliovaara's touch – and a natural rapport have been the keys to their success.
The pair have commonality in what Patten describes as "unconventional" paths to the top.
Patten, 28, is a late bloomer who studied finance at university in the United States.
In 2016, he spent the summer break from his studies working on the outdoor courts at Wimbledon as a data analyst for IBM.
Heliovarra, 35, stopped playing professionally in 2013 because of an autoimmune disease that affects his spine.
"I never really aspired to be a professional tennis player as a junior or when I was at university. I just kept doing quite well and it snowballed," Patten said.
"And Harri thought that was it for him when he stopped playing singles. He was working at the airport, had a stint in finance then came back to the sport.
"Now we're both very focused on tennis but we're multi-faceted in our backgrounds."
Patten says it feels like he has known Heliovaara for years, even though they only started spending time together from April.
Their friendship was further strengthened when Patten headed to Helsinki for a week of training in October, staying with Heliovaara, his wife and two small children in their family home.
After the serious business of training, Patten was keen to learn and experience as much about the Finnish way of life as he could.
Regular trips around the capital city to see the tourist sights were followed by some home cooking by Heliovaara - including his speciality dish of reindeer stew.
"He told me about halfway through that he was cooking it, so I was a little nervous about the outcome," laughs Patten.
"It was very good. I was very complimentary and he was very complimentary about his own cooking.
"I don't know what that says about him but he seemed to think he had done a very good job."
That sense of humour, alongside a deep mutual respect, underpins a stable partnership that they hope will give them a head start against a host of new men's pairings that have come together for this season.
The targets for the new season naturally start with another Grand Slam title in Melbourne, before a concerted effort for the world's top 10 aided by greater consistency on the ATP Tour.
"Everyone else is scrambling a little bit and not knowing how these partnerships are going to go," Patten said.
"Ours is a partnership which we know works and can be very effective.
"We're looking forward to kicking on. We have a lot to achieve."
