Former world No. 1 Kim Clijsters was known for her aggressive style of play and her movement on the court retrieving virtually every ball almost impossibly. But even top professional athletes have their bad days. The competition and pressure of playing at a high level of any sport is something the champions need to navigate through but on a few occasions, it gets the best of them. For Kim Clijsters, it came in the form of a panic attack on the court.

As documented with many other champions even Clijsters had her share of moments where she crumbled under the enormous pressure of competitive sports. The Bulgarian featured on a podcast sharing her story of how wanting to prove herself resulted in a dire situation.

When Kim Clijsters couldn’t control her body or breathing

In the latest episode of Served With Andy Roddick, Clijsters shared her story of suffering a panic attack during one of her practice sessions at the 2021 Indian Wells Masters Cup. She blamed it on the pressure to prove herself to her colleagues and said it was shocking as she couldn’t see it coming.

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“I played practice sets and was beating girls in practice but I just wanted to kinda prove it like in a match and during one of the practices I just started like, yeah really like I had a panic attack on the tennis court. Never had that in my life,” She says.

“It felt like for a second I felt like I was being a drama queen,” she adds, highlighting the fact that she didn’t know how to deal with it. Getting into the detail she further explains that trying to calm herself down didn’t help and so she had to approach it differently.

She asked her coach to stand at the net and hit the ball at her which made her focus on hitting the ball, “I had the rhythm of the sound of the ball like that, and that gave me my, my breathing rhythm came back.” Although Clijsters is not the only Champion who battles with pressure-induced anxiety; another former World No. 1 struggled with

‘Compassionate, was a hard word for me to understand’ – Victoria Azarenka

Victoria Azarenka attributed her hard-fought win in the semi-finals of the 2023 Australian Open to her mindset and conquering anxiety. Talking to reporters she said that she had been dealing with fear of failure for the past few months and the problem has drastically escalated.

“I was at the point where I couldn’t find anything I feel good about myself, not even one sentence,” She says. “That was a tough moment for me,” Azarenka said. The Belarusian told the reporters that she worked through it by making it simpler and accepting her anxiety. She even credited her ability to overcome anxiety for her new-found confidence saying that it even helps her be more compassionate. “Compassionate, was a hard word for me to understand.”

Pro athletes openly talking about their mental health challenges creates more awareness about such issues and helps people struggling with these hardships.

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