After sustaining an injury at Wimbledon in 2021 and opting out of the following Grand Slam tournaments, Serena Williams is back in the spotlight after announcing she would be playing at Wimbledon this year at 40-years-old.
Due to Serena being off the tour for a whole year, there is speculation about whether she would continue playing tennis at all. She responded in the interview that she had no plans to retire.
“I just didn’t know when and how I would come back,” as she put it. She chose Wimbledon to return to the tour not only because it is where she astonishingly won seven singles titles, but also because of the abrupt stop of her last year’s match due to a hamstring injury that left a hole in her heart. “You never want any match to end like that,” she said, “so it was a tremendous amount of motivation [to come back].”
“A part of me feels like that is a little bit more of my life now than tournaments,” she said, addressing a question about her interests outside tennis. Motherhood to her 4-year-old daughter, Olympia, and her business endeavors have kept her busy. She only recently hired a new coach, Eric Hechtman, who has been a friend for years and her sister Venus’s coach since 2019.
When asked what she would consider “a good outcome” at Wimbledon this year, her answer was straightforward about winning the event. However, she was evasive when asked if this was her final Wimbledon.
“I don’t know,” she said, “I can only tell you that I’m here. Who knows where I’ll pop up next? You’ve just got to be ready.” Her first-round match will be against Harmony Tan of France who ranked 113th on Tuesday June 28. Though ranked No. 1 for a long time, Serena now has a ranking outside of 1000. We will see whether experience will help overcome obstacles from age and lack of practice.
Besides the focus on tennis and her life, Serena Williams pushed away politics related questions during the news conference, particularly about last Friday’s Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade and Wimbledon’s decision to bar Russian and Belarusian players this year because of the war in Ukraine.
Due to Serena being off the tour for a whole year, there is speculation about whether she would continue playing tennis at all. She responded in the interview that she had no plans to retire.
“I just didn’t know when and how I would come back,” as she put it. She chose Wimbledon to return to the tour not only because it is where she astonishingly won seven singles titles, but also because of the abrupt stop of her last year’s match due to a hamstring injury that left a hole in her heart. “You never want any match to end like that,” she said, “so it was a tremendous amount of motivation [to come back].”
“A part of me feels like that is a little bit more of my life now than tournaments,” she said, addressing a question about her interests outside tennis. Motherhood to her 4-year-old daughter, Olympia, and her business endeavors have kept her busy. She only recently hired a new coach, Eric Hechtman, who has been a friend for years and her sister Venus’s coach since 2019.
When asked what she would consider “a good outcome” at Wimbledon this year, her answer was straightforward about winning the event. However, she was evasive when asked if this was her final Wimbledon.
“I don’t know,” she said, “I can only tell you that I’m here. Who knows where I’ll pop up next? You’ve just got to be ready.” Her first-round match will be against Harmony Tan of France who ranked 113th on Tuesday June 28. Though ranked No. 1 for a long time, Serena now has a ranking outside of 1000. We will see whether experience will help overcome obstacles from age and lack of practice.
Besides the focus on tennis and her life, Serena Williams pushed away politics related questions during the news conference, particularly about last Friday’s Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe v. Wade and Wimbledon’s decision to bar Russian and Belarusian players this year because of the war in Ukraine.
