Former Wimbledon finalist Eugenie Bouchard recently explained the difficulty of maintaining tennis and pickleball careers simultaneously.
Bouchard was once a top talent who made a deep run at Wimbledon, seemingly proving her potential as a player. Many expected her career to take off after that, but it didn't, and there were many reasons for that.
From injuries to failing to form struggles, the Canadian never really fulfilled her potential on the WTA Tour. Now 30, Bouchard has moved on from only playing tennis as she launched a pickleball career, which she now juggles alongside tennis.
She's not solely committed to either sport, playing both tennis and pickleball, and during the recent appearance on Caroline Garcia's podcast, she talked about the difficulty of juggling both careers at the same time.
It makes sense because while there are some similarities between the sports, they are very different. The instincts needed for both are different, so juggling them would never be easy, even for a very talented athlete like Bouchard.
"It's hard to kind of transition between the two so I did two tennis in a row, now I'll do a couple of pickle in a row. I kind of do like groups because going back and forth is just so hard and I'd rather not have to switch too many times during the year."
Bouchard has famously always been the type of person who doesn’t just do one thing. Even when she was fully committed to tennis, the Canadian always had some activities away from the tennis courts.
Sometimes, she modeled, and sometimes, she provided tennis commentary, which she still does. Her life can be quite busy, and sometimes, she feels like she's doing too much.
"For now [I want to keep playing both sports professionally], we'll see how long this lasts because I'm adding a lot on my plate."
Ideally, she would have played tennis, but that didn’t work out as well as she had thought, so it was time to pivot to another career. Despite not allocating 100% of her time to tennis, she's still an active player.
She made a decent comeback attempt in recent years, but somehow, it never really worked out for her. In recent years, she's made a couple of quarter-finals, including two last year.
This year, Bouchard only managed to play four tennis matches, with her most recent coming in Toronto. Overall, the Canadian hasn’t had a proper tennis season since the pandemic.
Her last proper tennis season was in 2018, when she played 52 matches, but she also played 30 matches in 2020. She hasn't been seriously in tennis for a long time, even though she's not officially retired.
Time will tell what the future brings her, but it seems like it will involve lots of different endeavors—from tennis to pickleball to commentary to possibly other engagements.
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