Tennis might be thrilling to watch, but behind the scenes, it’s a grind. Weeks blur together with back-to-back tournaments. The cut-off rules of the ATP and WTA Tours force pros to navigate more than 60 events a year across continents. Add the Grand Slams, national team battles, the Olympics, plus a stack of Challenger and ITF events, and the calendar overflows. And Taylor Townsend isn’t about to stay quiet about it now.

In a chat with Clay Tennis, the tennis mom with two doubles Grand Slams laid it all bare. She spoke honestly about how the tour schedule wears players down. She said, “A big one is the schedule — there’s no real off-season. And when it comes to prize money, the distribution throughout the year isn’t balanced, aside from the Slams and a few Masters 1000s, since not all of them offer equal prize money.” This debate has been going on for ages.

Past champions like Serena and Venus Williams, Billie Jean King, and others have fought for equal pay. King was a trailblazer, leading the push that secured equal prize money at the US Open in 1973. Venus played a huge role in Wimbledon and the French Open, finally matching pay, with Wimbledon making it official in 2007. She even addressed the Grand Slam Committee and penned a powerful essay in The Times. Equal pay has always been on WTA players’ minds.

As Townsend stressed, “It’s not just the playing schedule — it’s also the travel, the constant changes in location, the surface shifts, the ball changes. We’re always adjusting. And the people making the rules don’t go through that. Yet we’re expected to perform at our best every single week. At the end of the day, we’re human beings — not robots.” Her words echo what ATP star and American No.1 Taylor Fritz said not long ago.

At the Canadian Open, according to Puntodebreak, Fritz weighed the pros and cons of the Masters expansion. He liked having a rest day between matches but warned that cramming six games into a week would be “excessive.” The downside, he said, was that it added more weeks to an already packed season. He suggested cutting other events instead and using that time for a proper preseason.

Some see it as just the cost of doing business in tennis. Taylor Townsend disagrees. For her, the grind isn’t only about matches—it’s the constant travel, the mental strain, and the toll on the body and spirit. Tennis, she said, is something players have loved and sacrificed for since childhood, but keeping that love alive while treating it like a full-time job “isn’t easy.”

Additionally, as a PTPA executive board member, Townsend says it’s reassuring to know she’s not speaking out alone. Even the organization’s cofounder, Novak Djokovic, has talked about how tennis has the longest season of any sport, often leading to burnout and making players feel like they “lose” themselves along the way. Not to mention, this isn’t the first time she’s raised this issue!

Taylor Townsend calls out strenuous tour life

Earlier this season, Townsend barely slowed down after starting her season with a first-round clash at the Australian Open on January 14. She zipped from the ‘Singapore Open’ to ‘Abu Dhabi’ and ‘Qatar’ — all within weeks. Her last singles face-off was a tough qualifier against Japan’s Aoi Ito. Fresh off a Melbourne Major doubles title with Katerina Siniakova, Townsend switched gears for the Dubai Tennis Championships, set to challenge Lulu Sun and Peyton Stearns on February 19. After her singles exit, the two-time Grand Slam doubles champ didn’t mince words about the relentless pace.

On Instagram, she nailed the vibe with a meme: a guy wildly grooving to “Raindrop Droptop.” Townsend joked, “Me trying to keep my sh– together after 7 weeks on the road, 5 countries, and 5 time zones 😂😶🌫️.” Classic Townsend—honest, hilarious, and totally relatable. And she’s made it clear before that nonstop travel is no laughing matter.

Last August was déjà vu. Townsend hustled between the Canadian Open and Cincinnati Open—playing back-to-back matches with stressful logistics and sky-high costs. “I have to play at 5 o’clock tomorrow at Cincinnati. It’s stressful trying to figure out how to get out of Toronto and how to get to Cincinnati. The only flight out of Toronto is like $1400 a person, and a layover, no matter what,” she revealed, shining a light on just how intense life on tour really is.

A year later, not much has changed. Taylor still talks about the exhaustion of flying around—and the pain of being away from her son Adyn. She’s in good company, with Iga Swiatek, Carlos Alcaraz, and more all calling out just how intense the tour grind really is. Now that Taylor keeps shining a light on these challenges, could change be coming soon? Drop your thoughts in the comments below!