{"id":169276,"date":"2025-09-30T00:30:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T00:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/169276\/"},"modified":"2025-09-30T00:30:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T00:30:08","slug":"iga-swiatek-says-tennis-season-is-too-long-and-too-intense-with-players-health-at-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/169276\/","title":{"rendered":"Iga Swiatek says tennis season is \u2018too long and too intense\u2019 with players\u2019 health at risk"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 jEZjIj\">From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it&#8217;s investigating the financials of Elon Musk&#8217;s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, &#8216;The A Word&#8217;, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 jEZjIj\">At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 jEZjIj\">The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n<p>Your support makes all the difference.Read more<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/iga-swiatek\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Iga Swiatek<\/a> has added her voice to the chorus of players saying the tennis season is putting excessive strain on players\u2019 bodies, warning it is \u201ctoo long and too intense\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The world No 2 suggested she would skip some mandatory tournaments in the future to protect her health, risking losing points under the rules governing the tennis ranking system.<\/p>\n<p>Swiatek advanced to the last 16 of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/china-open\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">China Open<\/a> after opponent Camila Osorio retired hurt before the start of the second set of their third-round encounter, with another four matches on Monday finishing early due to player retirements.<\/p>\n<p>The Pole said afterwards: \u201cIt&#8217;s just impossible to squeeze it in the schedule. Maybe I will have to choose some tournaments and skip them, even though they are mandatory.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have to be smart about it &#8211; not really unfortunately care about the rules and just think what\u2019s healthy for us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>From last year the Women\u2019s Tennis Association (WTA) introduced mandatory requirements for top players to enter all four grand slams, all 10 WTA 1,000 events, and six 500-level tournaments. <\/p>\n<p>Swiatek said the requirements were \u201cpretty crazy\u201d, and that fatigue increased throughout the second half of a long season. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don&#8217;t know yet how my career is going to look like in a couple of years,\u201d she said. \u201cThe only thing I can do now, when I decided I&#8217;m going to play all these mandatory tournaments, is to just take care of my body, take care of the recovery.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Asian swing is the hardest part because you feel like the season is going to finish soon, but you still need to push.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut yeah, there are a lot of injuries. It is because the season is too long and too intense.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Beijing, which is a combined WTA 1000 and ATP 500 event, has been hit by a string of injuries to top names. Czech teenager Jakub Mensik retired with a leg issue when trailing 1-4 to third seed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/alex-de-minaur\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Alex de Minaur<\/a>, who advanced to a semi-final meeting with world No 2 Jannik Sinner. <\/p>\n<p>Fourth seed <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/lorenzo-musetti\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Lorenzo Musetti<\/a> was hampered by a thigh or groin problem as he retired 4-6 6-3 3-0 down to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/learner-tien\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Learner Tien<\/a>, who progressed to his first ATP Tour semi-final as a result. <\/p>\n<p>Swiatek will play Emma Navarro in the fourth round after the American advanced thanks to Lois Boisson retiring when down 6-2, 1-0 in their match, with home favourite Zheng Qinwen also forced to retire as her injury-disrupted season continues. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169277,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-169276","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169276","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=169276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}