![\"Sep](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/425811de57b602fede28d469c2deccd1.jpeg\"\/)
<\/p>\nOne of the best tennis players of all-time nearly died from a drug addiction in the 1990s.<\/p>\n
Bjorn Borg, one of the greatest male tennis players of all-time, opened up about his scary health struggles. The 11-time Grand Slam champion, who was ranked No. 1 in the world for 109 weeks, won 66 singles titles during his career. He’s considered one of the most dominant players of all-time.<\/p>\n
The iconic Swedish tennis star, who announced his shocking retirement from the game in 1983, recently released his memoir, titled “Heartbeats: A Memoir.” In the new book, Bjorg opens up about his drug addiction battles and near death.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Sep 23, 2022; London, United Kingdom; Casper Ruud (NOR) gets support from team Europe captain Bjorn Borg in his Laver Cup tennis match. Mandatory Credit: Peter van den Berg-USA TODAY Sports\u00a9 Peter van den Berg-Imagn Images<\/p>\n
Bjorg detailed his struggles after leaving the game of tennis in the early 1980s. He ultimately realized that it was a mistake.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I stopped playing tennis, I didn\u2019t have a schedule,\u201d Borg said in an interview with the Times, according to Tennis 365.<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d wake up in the morning and say to myself: I can do everything, anything. I\u2019m so happy.<\/p>\n \u201cBut I left tennis. I left my tennis friends. That was a big mistake. I left the people in tennis that I was around and I liked all these people.”<\/p>\n Borg struggled with drugs, alcohol<\/p>\n \u201cThe problem was that I didn\u2019t realize this \u2014 I had no plan. It finally came to a point: OK, what am I supposed to do now? I had no idea,” Borg added.<\/p>\n \u201cI was lost. I was lost in this world. I had no plan and that\u2019s a difficult life.<\/p>\n \u201cThen I started with the drugs or pills or alcohol; all these things. I think that was an escape from life \u2014 the reality just to escape. I didn\u2019t have to think about it.<\/p>\n \u201cI knew that I was not happy. I needed to do something but I had no idea what to do.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s better to take all these things [drugs] because then you escape, you don\u2019t think about it too much. And then they got worse and worse and worse. So stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n Borg ultimately had an overdose on cocaine. He hit his low point when his father, Rune, visited him in the hospital. Borg admitted that he was “lost.”<\/p>\n \u201cI had no plan. People today, they have guidance. I was lost in the world,\u201d Borg added in his book.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was more drugs, there was pills, alcohol, to escape myself from reality. I didn\u2019t have to think about it. Of course, it\u2019s not good, it destroys you as a person. I was close to dying many times. I fixed my life. I\u2019m very happy with myself.<\/p>\n \u201cThe first time I tried cocaine, I got the same kind of rush I used to get from tennis.”<\/p>\n This story was originally reported by The Spun<\/a> on Sep 23, 2025, where it first appeared in the Tennis<\/a> section. Add The Spun as a Preferred Source by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One of the best tennis players of all-time nearly died from a drug addiction in the 1990s. Bjorn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":157086,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[67180,25026,101,118,26677,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-157085","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-bjorn-borg","9":"tag-drug-addiction","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis","12":"tag-tennis-players","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom","15":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157085\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}