Roger Federer Chases 100 Titles, Then Connors

It is 99 down, 10 to go for Roger Federer, which is, of course, only one way of looking at things at this late stage in the Federer game.

He has chased only a few tennis records with genuine intent, including the men’s mark for Grand Slam singles titles, which Pete Sampras once held with 14 and which Federer now owns with 20.

But Jimmy Connors’s Open-era men’s record of 109 titles has hardly been Federer’s white whale, some career-long obsession that has kept him up nights or inspired him to do a round of extra sprints in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, with the fitness coach Pierre Paganini.

“Either it happens or it doesn’t,” he told Germany’s Tennis Magazin this year, referring to the 109. “If…