What’s Dominic Thiem doing a month away from the US Open? He’s still playing on the clay courts. The French Open finalist just made a quarters last week in Hamburg and will now attending the Kitzbuhel event this week in his home event in Austria.

Thiem has never won the Kitzbuhel title but he did make the finals in 2014 losing to David Goffin. Last year, he lost his opener to Martin Klizan then fell in his first match in Canada to Stefanos Tsitsipas before reaching the quarterfinals at the US Open where he lost a thriller to Rafael Nadal.

At least Thiem doesn’t have any points to defend until New York.

Interestingly, Thiem’s younger brother, Moritz, will play with Dominic’s coach Nicolas Massu in the doubles!

Two-time champion Philipp Kohlschreiber and former Top 10 Fernando Verdasco are also in the field. Kohlschreiber will meet Richard Gasquet in his opener.

Projected quarterfinals: Thiem-Mayer, Verdasco-Sonego, Carreno Busta-Cuevas, Fucsovics-Lajovic.

Kitzbuhel is the last clay event on the ATP calendar until next February!