Carlos Alcaraz picked up a wrist injury four months ago in Barcelona, which cost him two Grand Slams, one where he was the defending champion and the other a runner-up, and a total 5300 ATP ranking points. While he was recovering physically, the most difficult thing was to prepare himself for the uncertainties of his return.
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“They’ve been four and a half months in which I’ve been through everything.,” Alcaraz said in the press conference ahead of the US Open. “The first month was tough for me because I couldn’t do anything with my right arm. It was hard.”
He described the early stages of the injury sustained at the Barcelona Open in April, before explaining how the emotional toll shifted once physical recovery began.
“I enjoyed being with my family and friends, staying at home,” he added. “But once I started training a little, without knowing when I’d really be able to start, the thoughts were very hard to manage, because I didn’t know if I’d be ready for Cincinnati, for the US Open, or if I’d miss the entire American swing.”
The Spaniard was slated to make his return in the Cincinnati Open, but his recovery would take longer than expected as his team informed the organizers about his withdrawal from the tournament.
I’d say the intrusive thoughts were the hardest thing to face throughout this whole process,” he said, weighing in on the things that gave him the most trouble about not having a fixed date for return.
Ahead of his return, Alcaraz candidly admitted that it won’t be easy for him to jump straight into best-of-five tennis after such a long layoff, and the timing won’t be on his side. However, that doesn’t mean he is backing down.
“My team and I believe that I’m ready. It wasn’t an easy decision. We did very long and very intense training sessions, precisely to see how my wrist would react, and after those long days we saw that everything was working properly, and we believe it was the time to come back,” he said.
“I feel great and I think this injury has helped me a lot to understand that right now everything is in my head.”
Carlos Alcaraz won his first Grand Slam title at Arthur Ashe back in 2022. But before directly jumping back to the singles main draw, the Spaniard eased back into competition by joining forces with Serena Williams to play the mixed doubles event at the US Open. The duo won their first-round match against doubles specialist Erin Routliffe and Lloyd Glasspool but lost the quarterfinal clash against the event’s runners-up Belinda Bencic and Flavio Cobolli.
After going through both physical and mental challenges in the last four months, the defending champion and second seed will open his campaign against Roman Safiullin on Sunday, August 30th.