WIMBLEDON – Daniela Hantuchova is at Wimbledon this year for the 18 straight year.
But for the first year, she’s not playing.
So given she hasn’t played at all since May, it’s probably the perfect setting to announce a low-key retirement, at age 34.
“I thought it was going to be the most difficult decision of my life, and it was. It took me a while to make this step, but once I did it I just feel such incredible joy, happiness, relief in a way. All the emotions are coming together in an incredible and beautiful way,” Hantuchova told the WTA Tour in a story published on its website.
“I’m looking at everything that’s happening to me with such appreciation that I feel like I couldn’t have chosen a better time.”
A post shared by Daniela Hantuchova (@danielahantuchovaofficial) on Jul 4, 2017 at 10:57am PDT
As we posted up Wednesday, Hantuchova is at Wimbledon working for Fox Sports, mostly doing studio analysis work.
She mentioned Thursday that she would have more news; it wasn’t tough to figure out what that news likely would be.
Impressive career
The Slovak, who reached No. 5 in both singles and doubles in 2002 and 2003, respectively, had a better than solid career. And a long one.
She won seven career singles titles – none bigger than Indian Wells, twice. Hantuchova also won nine doubles titles. She didn’t win a major in women’s doubles, but she did get to three finals.
In mixed doubles, she won a career Slam:
*Wimbledon in 2001 with Leos Friedl (at 18).
*The Australian Open in 2002 with Kevin Ullyett
*The French Open in 2005 with Fabrice Santoro
*The US Open in 2005 with Mahesh Bhupathi.
“After Madrid, after I had a stress fracture in my rib I couldn’t do anything for months,” Hantuchova told the tour website. “Those are the times you start to think about everything.”
Hantuchova didn’t actually play the Madrid event. Her last tournament was the International in Rabat, Morocco, the first week of May. she lost in the final round of qualifying there. Before that, she played a series of small $25,000 ITFs in Italy.
Here are some shots over the years from the various tournaments, with Hantuchova always making whatever she wore look just a little better.
A glamourpuss who also had game
It was always kind of surprising that the WTA Tour didn’t make better use of her glamorous self beyond a lot of publicity early on about her 44-inch legs. It’s not as though they’re above doing that sort of thing.
And she didn’t have to work hours to try to get that look, or look uncomfortable with the next-level couture, hair and makeup; she’s just a natural glamour-puss.
With a ranking outside the top 300, she had made judicious use of wild cards into bigger events during the year. But the results were no longer coming.
Hantuchova already has her own business venture going, selling vegan and raw protein bars and the like (if that’s what she’s eating to look the way she does, sign us up).
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