\n The wheelchair tennis star from Verwood returns to the Miami Open aiming for back-to-back victories alongside partner Aniek van Koot, after the pair lifted the women\u2019s doubles trophy at the Hard Rock Stadium 12 months ago.\n<\/p>\n
\n Their win came during the tournament\u2019s wheelchair tennis exhibitions, but this year marks a historic step forward as the Miami Open hosts a WT500 world ranking event on the UNIQLO Wheelchair Tennis Tour for the first time.\n<\/p>\n
\n Lucy Shuker (GBR) (Image: Louisiana Photographic Society)\n<\/p>\n
\n Ms Shuker said: “Miami is a step forward on the wheelchair tour.\n<\/p>\n
\n “To be part of an iconic event such as the Miami Open is an honour and will show the Miami crowd what wheelchair tennis players can do.\n<\/p>\n
\n “It\u2019s a small draw (eight players), so to qualify alone is extremely hard and every match is going to be tough, but I\u2019ll give it my all and I\u2019m looking forward to partnering again with Aniek and trying to defend our title.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Ms Shuker, a T4 paraplegic since being injured in a motorcycle accident in 2001 and the highest world-ranked female player for someone of her spinal lesion and functional ability.\n<\/p>\n
\n She and Van Koot head into the Miami Open fresh from a runner-up finish at the 2026 Cajun Classic in Baton Rouge.\n<\/p>\n
\n Despite trailing 4-0 in the second set of the final against Zhu Zhenzhen and Momoko Ohtani, the pair fought back before losing 6-4, 7-6(3).\n<\/p>\n
\n Lucy Shuker and Aniek van Koot in action at the 2026 Cajun Classic. (Image: Louisiana Photographic Society)\n<\/p>\n
\n Ms Shuker said: “Reflecting on last weekend\u2019s doubles final in Baton Rouge, I feel proud of how we fought.\n<\/p>\n
\n “Ultimately, we didn\u2019t get the title at one of my favourite tournaments, but we showed how we can really pull together even when facing a tough task.\n<\/p>\n
\n “In the second set after going 4-0 and 5-2 down we found a real calm, solid level of play and if we hadn\u2019t had the error-prone part of the match, it could have been a different story.\n<\/p>\n
\n “But that\u2019s tennis and I\u2019ll definitely take the positives out of it into Miami.”\n<\/p>\n
\n Shuker\u2019s return to Miami not only marks her pursuit of another trophy, but also her continued contribution to the growth of wheelchair tennis, a sport that celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2026.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The wheelchair tennis star from Verwood returns to the Miami Open aiming for back-to-back victories alongside partner Aniek…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":498913,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-498912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498912","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=498912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498912\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}