Before heading to Shanghai, many of the ATP Tour's biggest stars were in Beijing for the China Open, where Dominic Thiem won his fourth title of 2019 on Sunday.

The Austrian says this has been the best campaign of his career, highlighted by a first Masters 1000 trophy and second French Open final. And before his victory in the Chinese capital, the 26-year-old joined Wang Dong to chat about this season and his career, in the latest edition of Beyond The Baseline.

"It's so far the best season of my life," said the Austrian. Thiem's victory in Indian Wells was followed by wins in Barcelona, Kitzbuhel, and Beijing. Yet, the world number five set a higher goal. "The season is not over yet, I am trying to make it better," said Thiem.

"The last thing (I need to break through) is the Grand Slam title, it's the biggest thing which you could achieve in tennis."

Looking back on his victory over Roger Federer, Thiem considers the high-profile win boosted his confidence. "You know that you can beat best players ever in this sports, so it's nice to play against them on the big stages."

The 26-year-old also shared his thoughts about what makes great players unique: "I take Rafa for example, he is playing every point like it is the last one, every point like it's a match point, so that's why if you want to beat him you have to fight for two or three hours, fully focused on the court, that makes him so hard to beat." Thiem smiled, "But I beat him (in Barcelona), so the next challenge is to beat him in Roland Garros, hopefully."

Playing tennis at the age of six, the Austrian grew up playing on clay and said it remained his favorite surface."There was almost only clay courts in Austria, so it's my favorite. But my biggest title I got so far was on the hard court, so nobody knows what happens."

The China Open champion also said he would prefer a Grand Slam title to the world number one. "It's a very personal opinion, both of them are unbelievable achievements, and one comes with another, I think it's now very hard to be world number one without winning a major tournament."