Novak Djokovic makes no secret of the way he loves to feed off negativity during a tennis match. Doesn’t really matter whether he’s ahead or behind on the scoreboard. The guy simply finds motivation and inspiration from all manner of slights, real and perceived.

Maybe it’s how a chair umpire is officiating that particular day ... or the way Djokovic’s entourage is sitting in place in the stands instead of rising to encourage him ... or the criticism he receives for wading into a political issue — all of which already have happened during this French Open.

Or maybe it’s how he’s treated by the spectators who, as they did on Friday during Djokovic’s 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5), 6-2 victory over 29th-seeded Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in the third round at Roland Garros, get on his case and jeer him for seemingly no good reason at all.

Which is what happened at Court Philippe Chatrier during the longest three-set Grand Slam match of the 22-time major champion Djokovic’s long and distinguished career, clocking in at 3 hours, 36 minutes. He wasn’t thrilled at how difficult things had been in the match, didn’t love double-faulting three times in a single game, and really didn’t like the feedback coming from a portion of the fans.

“A majority of the people comes to enjoy tennis or support one or the other player. But they are individuals. There are people — there are groups or whatever — that love to boo every single thing you do. That’s something that I find disrespectful and I frankly don’t understand that,” Djokovic said later at his news conference. “But it’s their right. They paid the ticket. They can do whatever they want.”

In addition to the No. 3 Djokovic, other seeded men advancing included No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz and No. 5 Stefanos Tsitsipas, the runner-up to Djokovic in Paris two years ago and at the Australian Open this year.

No. 2 Aryna Sabalenka and No. 9 Daria Kasatkina moved into the women’s fourth round, along with Sloane Stephens, Elina Svitolina and 2021 runner-up Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, but No. 3 Jessica Pegula was sent packing after a 6-1, 6-3 loss to Elise Mertens.

Golf

Lee, Knight share second-round LPGA lead >> Minjee Lee matched the tournament best with an 8-under 64 for a share of the lead in the LPGA Tour’s weather-delayed Mizuho Americas Open in Jersey City, N.J.

Cheyenne Knight had a 68 to join Lee at 7-under 137 atop the tightly bunched leaderboard in the inaugural event that features five top-10 players and promising newcomer Rose Zhang from Stanford.

No. 3 Lydia Ko was a shot back after a 69.

Top-ranked Jin Young Ko (66) was 5 under with No. 6 Atthaya Thitikul (71), No. 8 Brooke Henderson (70), Aditi Ashok (72) and Zhang (69), the two-time NCAA individual champion who turned pro last week and received a sponsor’s exemption to play.

Zhang finished with three pars in her 69, a shot better than her professional debut.

Suh takes PGA lead at the Memorial >> Justin Suh shot a 6-under 66 at the Memorial while he holed eight putts from the 10-foot range or longer to give him a one-shot lead over past champion Hideki Matsuyama, with two-time Memorial champion Patrick Cantlay another shot behind.

Suh was at 8-under 136 going into the week as he aims for his first PGA Tour title.

The group four shots behind included Rory McIlroy (68) and Jon Rahm (70).

Track and field

Kipyegon sets world record in 1,500 >> Faith Kipyegon broke the women’s 1,500 meters world record at the Golden Gala in Florence, Italy.

She became the first woman to better 3 minutes, 50 seconds when the Kenyan won in 3:49.11 in the Diamond League meet.

The two-time Olympic and two-time world champion took almost a second off the record of 3:50.07 by Genzebe Dibaba of Ethiopia in 2015.

Horse racing

Racing suspended at Churchill Downs >> Churchill Downs will suspend racing on Wednesday and move the remainder of its spring meet to Ellis Park to conduct a “top-to-bottom” review of safety and surface protocols in the wake of 12 horse fatalities the past month at the home of the Kentucky Derby.

A release Friday afternoon stated that no single factor has been identified as a potential cause for the fatalities or pattern detected, but it decided to relocate the meet “in an abundance of caution.”