Nadal defeats Lapentti, to become the new #1.

It's official now. On either August 4th, 11th, or 18th Rafael Nadal will become the new #1. The date will be determined by his results in Cincinnati. Although it's exciting to have a new person at the top of the game for the first time in four and a half years it's also kind of sad to see Federer's game deteriorate to the point where he was no longer able to hold onto his position as the number one player. If anything I would have expected Federer's decline to be more gradual. Last year it was evident that he wasn't playing as well as he had been. He got upset a few times by Canas, he lost more frequently than he had in the past and it was the first time in three years that he hadn't won at least 10 titles but he still delivered at the majors. Sure, it was inevitable that at some point he wouldn't be able to swoop them all but you would never have expected 8 months ago that Federer would be potentially looking at a slamless year.

Here's a recap of Federer's year so far.

1.Federer loses at the Australian Open to Djokovic in the semi-finals. This was kind of a surprise because Fed was the two time defending champion but Djokovic is an up and comer and did pretty well at the US Open in 2007 and Federer was recovering from mono (or so he said) so I can let that slide. Tournament record, 0/1.

2. Loses at Dubai to Andy Murray in the first round 7-6, 3-6, 4-6. 0/2.

3. The veteran Mardy Fish, crushes Federer for a place in the finals 6-3, 6-2. Red flag, Federer has never lost to Fish before, in fact Fish had only won one set from Federer before the match. It's now becoming apparent that Federer's got some problems. 0/3.

4. Loses to Roddick the very next week at The Sony Ericson Open. Roddick ends his consecutive losing streak to Fed at 11. Something is seriously wrong if Federer loses to Roddick! 0/4.

5. Federer decides to enter The Estoril Open as his warm up for the clay events. He's obviously a whale in a small pond but that doesn't stop him from struggling all the way through the tournament. He played a tight match against Oliver Rochuse in the first round has another one in the semi-finals against someone named Gremelmayr and could have been in serious danger in the finals if Nikolay Davydenko hadn't been forced to retire with a leg injury. Still, it's a win for Federer and he gets himself on the board 1/5.

6. Plays at the ATP Masters Series: Monte Carlo and almost gets embarrassed against Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo in the first round before coming back to win in three sets. Federer, then proceeds to make it to the finals where he gets snuffed out by Nadal 7-5, 7-5. Not bad from Federer (except for the Hidalgo hic-up) probably on par with last year. 1/6.

7. His next tournament in Rome, had a surprising result when defending Rafael Nadal loses early due to blister problems. The tournament was pretty much Federer's to lose but he still manages to blow it against Radek Stepanek in the quarters 6-7, 6-7. 1/7.

8. Federer loses to Rafa at the ATP Masters Series: Hamburg. The sad thing is that Federer was up 5-1 in the first set and still winds up losing the set. Come on Roger, pull it together. 1/8.

9. Roland Garros is the next tournament and if anything you'd probably think he'd crash out early here but Federer, surprises us and makes it to the finals pretty easily. Once he gets there it's a different story and he gets slaughtered by Nadal and walks away looking like a chump instead of a champ. 1/9.

10. Federer goes into the Gerry Webber Open knowing that if he's going to save the rest of the season from being a complete disaster he's going to have to start winning tournaments. Luckily he still has his grass court winning streak and he wins the Open without dropping a set. 2/10.

11. He enters Wimbledon with allot of talk about how he's been declining but he puts most of that talk on hold by storming into the finals without dropping a set. He meets Rafa in the finals and pushes him to his limit but in the end Nadal manages to squeak. No criticism for Federer here, he played an amazing tournament just got unlucky that it didn't go his way. 2/11.

12. Obviously the Wimbledon loss hit him hard and he proved that by losing in the first round to Giles Simon in Toronto. 2/12.

13. As the defending champion in Cincinnati Federer gets thing off to a shaky start against Robby Ginepri but he manages to win the match however Karlovic beats him in the next round. Federer also loses his #1 ranking in Cincinnati. 2/13.

While this hasn't been a good year for Federer, I think there's a good possibility that he'll be able to recoup during the time off between the Tennis Masters Cup and the start of the next season and if he gets himself a good coach he might be able to start winning some tournaments again. At least, that's what I'm hoping but for the rest of this season Nadal and Djokovic will continue to be the heavy favorites against him.