Rafael Nadal said he will not play at Wimbledon next month as expected and will instead focus on this summer's Olympics in Paris, where he will play in singles and doubles with recent French Open champion Carlos Alcaraz.
Nadal, 38, announced his decision to skip Wimbledon, a tournament he won in 2008 and 2010, in a statement on social media. He cited the same concerns about having to train his body to play on grass and then return to clay courts that he mentioned after his first-round loss to Alexander Zverev at last month's French Open. The Olympic tennis tournament will be held at Roland Garros, where Nadal has won the French Open a record 14 times.
“Until then I believe it is best for my body to continue playing on clay courts without changing courts,” he wrote.
The 22-time Grand Slam champion has already won a few Olympic medals – singles gold in Beijing in 2008 and doubles gold with Marc Lopez in Rio de Janeiro in 2016 – but he has never played in an Olympic Games on his preferred court. This year's Olympics will be played on clay for the first time since Barcelona in 1992.
The tournament will run from July 27th to August 4th.
Nadal will prepare for the Olympics by playing a clay-court tournament in Bastia, Sweden, which he has not played since 2005. He has played just 16 singles matches since the start of 2023 because of injuries, including a hip that underwent surgery and nagging abdominal problems.
