As Ţiriac was never a fan of too much down time, he suggested I play the tournament on the grass of Beckenham in south London, which took place in the second week of the French Open. This was another tournament where the courts are not regular grass courts. They’re marked out on a cricket field, and they’re pretty terrible, but it’s great practice. I reached the semi-finals, where I lost to Mayotte in three sets, so it was a good week. That was the Saturday, the much bigger tournament at London’s Queen’s Club started on the Monday, and I was just in the flow of things. No injuries, confident, young, back on grass, my ankle fully healed, and I was playing every week.

I wasn’t seeded for Queen’s but I went through the rounds, and on the Friday I played two matches because of rain – I played my third round in the morning and quarter-final in the afternoon. But it didn’t matter, I was like a bull, I could have played 10 sets that day. I beat David Pate in the morning, and Pat Cash in the afternoon – 6-4, 6-4.

By then there was the sense that something strange was going on. People were in awe, they made funny comments, such as: ‘what is this, it isn’t right that this guy should be winning like this.’ I felt I had so much power I could hit harder than anyone else. In practice I would show off and hit even harder than I’m supposed to hit, and play with the idea that I had this power. That’s where the nickname ‘Boom Boom’ came from. I was playing doubles with Vijay Amritraj in the spring of 1985 in Rotterdam; we got to the semi-finals and became friends, and he was the first one to nickname me ‘Boom Boom’ because I hit the ball so hard. Sometimes I hit it too hard when it wasn’t always necessary, but that’s the way I played – I had no soft shot, which is something of a weakness, but it meant I just belted the ball.