Many tennis pundits felt that Rafael Nadal had little chance in the final of the 2009 Australian Open against Roger Federer. Nadal might have been king on the slower surfaces of Roland Garros and Wimbledon, but on Australian hardcourts, many felt that Federer had the advantage heading into the tournament.

When these two remarkable champions did ultimately secure their slots in this title tilt, the calculus seemed to favor the Swiss to an even greater degree. Surely, a rested Federer–given a Thursday semifinal that lasted just over two hours–would have more in the tank than an exhausted Nadal, who played a Friday semifinal that lasted over 5 hours and bled into Saturday morning. Surely, the world No. 1 would not be able to keep up with Federer for five full sets. From the way the chattering classes were talking about this match, Rafael Nadal was going to show up, try his best, absorb a four-set defeat, and be happy about reaching his first-ever hardcourt Grand Slam final.

How utterly wrong the masses proved to be.

If there’s one thing that should never again be said about Nadal, it’s that the Mallorcan should be expected to run out of energy in a Grand Slam final. Circumstances, as worrisome as they may be, will not rattle the 22-year-old–that much should be clear after Nadal won his first Australian Open championship, and his sixth slam overall, with a marvelous 7-5, 3-6, 7-6 (3), 3-6, 6-2 victory over a gallant but ultimately inferior Federer. The fiercely-fought battle in Rod Laver Arena took 4 hours and 22 minutes, putting Nadal on court for a total of nearly 10 hours in his last two matches alone. Yet, at the end of this spirited and supreme showdown between the two best players in the world, Nadal was standing tall in his moment of victory, covering the court with ease and retrieving everything an increasingly flustered Federer threw at him. The word “tired” is not a part of Nadal’s vocabulary, and any remaining doubters have to accept that fact.

If fitness and endurance figured to be major factors in this match, they weren’t on Sunday night in Melbourne. Even if such issues were indeed paramount in deciding the winner of this match, they seemed to affect the 27-year-old Federer more than his younger opponent. A pronounced dip in Nadal’s court coverage never really emerged. The fade from full fitness in a fifth set never materialized for the best tennis player on the planet, as Nadal remained steady and fresh while the error-prone Federer–perhaps expecting his foe to relax–lost serve at 1-2 in the fifth to give Nadal a clear path to victory.

Blessed with a cushion and smelling the finish line, Nadal authoritatively held serve on two occasions before breaking Federer to win the match in the first minutes of Monday morning (12:12 a.m. in Melbourne).

Yes, one can rightly point to Federer’s stack of failed break point conversions late in the third set–at 4-all, love-40, and 5-all, 15-40–as the match’s key points, but in those sequences, it needs to be said that Nadal played his customarily airtight and error-free barnd of ball. Federer had a particularly good look at a slow second serve on one of the break points in the 4-all game of the third, but when he did nothing with it, his unshakable rival didn’t allow another inch. Nadal has reached the mountaintop in his sport because of an uncanny ability to play mistake-free tennis in a match’s most significant moments. No matter how much court time he might have logged, Nadal possessed maximum focus and energy whenever he needed to call upon his considerable internal resources. Conventional wisdom suggested that Rafa would need to win this match sooner rather than later. Perhaps for the final time, conventional wisdom underestimated the willpower of this special specimen from Spain.

It’s worth noting–as one tries to place this magnificent match in a larger historical context–that Nadal’s sixth slam championship has been achieved at the age of 22. Federer won his first slam title (the 2003 Wimbledon tournament) just one month before his 22nd birthday. When one then considers that Nadal has now won slams on three different courts, any event-specific questions about his abilities have been put to rest. Nadal will be the favorite at this year’s French Open and Wimbledon events, and he’ll merit co-favorite status (if not the designation of an outright favorite) at the U.S. Open in New York. If this amazing young man’s body holds up, the record books rewritten over the past five years by Federer could soon be transformed again by Nadal.

What, you say? Nadal will pass Sampras and Federer in slams when it’s all said and done? Preposterous, you claim.

Think again.

Federer–while not at his very best in this match, especially on a first serve that sank to a startlingly low 51 percent–nevertheless stayed in the arena long enough to force a fifth set. Displaying defense almost as good as Nadal’s, the Swiss dug out of his own fair share of serving troubles and, behind 71 winners, exhibited a level of play that would have easily defeated every other competitor on the ATP Tour. Against Nadal, however, a really good B-plus effort loaded with spectacular points merely leads to a five-set loss. Federer didn’t play the big points well–a handful of points is the only thing separating these two men–but he competed vigorously throughout this encounter and forced Nadal to continuously run down shots. On a night when two tennis greats lorded their prowess over the rest of the sport, one giant had to make the other giant look small, and that’s what Nadal did to Federer. The losing player didn’t give away the match; the winner took it with two-fisted totality.

Nadal is widely regarded as a warm, humble and gentle soul, a man for all seasons. After this tremendous five-set triumph over Federer, it’s clear that Nadal is more than a man for all seasons–he’s now a man for all surfaces. Hail the new champion Down Under, a man who refused to buckle under in the face of a massive assault from the varied arsenal of a 13-time major champion. With more steely and unflappable performances such as this one, Nadal could rewrite the very record books Federer came so close to changing on an unforgettable night of tennis in Australia.