Following the biggest night of her tennis life - triumphing 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 over Aryna Sabalenka in the Australian Open final - an incredibly open Madison Keys came to speak to the media just before midnight in Melbourne.
Taking a glass of champagne on her way in, the 29-year-old was visibly overjoyed, mixed with a sense of relief, having just achieved a feat that had weighed on her for two decades.
Keys - who was initially attracted to tennis after watching Venus Williams at Wimbledon as a four-year-old - loved playing the game from the outset; a fact she told the viewers of her personal website as a teenager.
"When I tried tennis, I loved it," Keys' post read.
"I played against my garage door, then on my driveway and then my parents took me to the court after school every day."
That post came at a time when Keys was dominating the junior scene - going 19-0 in tournaments across 2007 - and first beginning to be touted as a major champion.
"It definitely started pretty young. Probably 11, 12, something like that," Keys told the press room when asked the first time she was told she'd win a Grand Slam.
Having first competed at the professional level on her 14th birthday in 2009, it's pressure that has long weighed on the now 29-year-old; and an expectation she wasn't sure she could meet.
"I think as I got older and I had gotten close and...you're obviously in the later stages of your career, it kind of feels like, will this ever actually happen?" Keys revealed.
"If it doesn't happen, I didn't live up to what everyone told me I should have done."
Keys - who reached the 2015 Australian Open semifinals and the 2017 US Open final, without breaking through - naturally struggled with the thought that her window of opportunity may have closed.
"[The expectation] went from being something positive to something that was almost, like, a little bit of a panic of, why haven't I been able to do it?..What if I never do it? If I don't do it, am I considered a failure?
"That was a pretty heavy burden to kind of carry around."
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The American - whose career has had various highs and lows, from a rise inside the top-10 to a fall outside the top-80, plus a series of injuries including wrist surgery - has come to learn that the journey is what matters, not the destination.
"I think everything kind of happens for a reason," Keys said.
"I finally got to the point where I was proud of myself and proud of my career, with or without a Grand Slam...where I was okay if it didn't happen. I didn't need it to feel like I had a good career or that I deserved to be talked about as a great tennis player.
"I feel like finally letting go of that internal talk that I had, just gave me the ability to actually go out and play some really good tennis; to actually win a Grand Slam."
The shifting philosophy - which has largely been a result of therapy - has enabled Keys to play with more freedom; a change which has been particularly noticeable in 2025.
"In the past, I felt sometimes during matches, especially when things started to go away, I was almost not in my own body and I was kind of looking down at myself. I felt like I couldn't connect my brain to my body.
"I felt like last year, I started being able to just be more in the moment and take each point by point, instead of panicking and getting a little bit too broad."
That changed mindset was eloquently displayed at the latter stage of her semifinal match against Swiatek, where Keys saved a match point en route to victory, and again from 5-5 in the third set of the final.
Having previously admitted to regretting her passive play in crucial moments - most notably during her 2023 US Open semifinal against Sabalenka - Keys took a different approach this time, unleashing a series of forehand winners to close out the match decisively.
"[It's] definitely one of the things that I'm most proud of," Keys said.
"I just kept telling myself, be brave, go for it, just kind of lay it all out on the line.
"Kind of at that point, no matter what happens, if I do that, then I can be proud of myself. It just made it a little bit easier.
After two decades of work and immense pressure, the 29-year-old is now deservedly a major champion; and it may not be for the last time.
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