Caroline Garcia has announced this season will be the last she plays before retiring from the Tour at the age of 31.
Garcia, who won the 2022 WTA Finals and has been ranked as high as fourth in the world, issued a statement on Friday morning confirming that she will retire at some stage this year. Although she is yet to confirm what her final tournament will be. Her announcement comes two days before the start of her home Grand Slam at Roland Garros where she will be making her 14th appearance.
“After 15 years competing at the highest level, and more than 25 years investing pretty much every second of my life into it, I feel ready to start a new chapter,” Garcia wrote in a post uploaded to social media.
“Still, this is not over – not just yet. I still have some tournaments left. The first one is at home, at Roland-Garros. My 14th consecutive time being part of it. And my last. So, to all my tennis family who’ll be around, let’s meet one more time, to dream and fight together.”
The Frenchwoman has won just three out of nine matches played so far this season and is yet to claim back-to-back victories at a tournament. Garcia ended last season early after saying she felt “exhausted” by anxiety and panic attacks triggered by the pressure of playing on the Tour. Earlier in her career, she took a break from the sport due to a foot injury and later revealed she suffered from an eating disorder during that period. In an interview with L’Equipe, Garcia said she experienced “many tears, many sleepless nights.”
Despite her personal challenges, Garcia still managed to achieve success on the Tour. Reaching the quarter-finals of the 2017 French Open and the semi-finals of the US Open five years later. Overall, she has won 11 WTA titles with three of those being at 1000 events and another at the WTA Finals.
In the doubles, Garcia won the French Open twice and reached the final of the US Open alongside Kristina Mladenovic. She peaked at a ranking high of No.2 in 2016.
“In the coming days, there will be more time to share what’s next for me. But for now, I just want to focus on living these last weeks as a tennis pro to the fullest,” she said of her future plans.
Garcia will begin her final French Open campaign against America’s Bernarda Pera.
