Quote of the Day: Victoria Azarenka doesn’t recommend tennis for “mental wellness”

DUBAI—Victoria Azarenka was in a darkly comic mood after winning ugly at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, turning around a double-break deficit to defeat Anhelina Kalinina, 2-6, 7-6 (4), 6-4.

The win was just her second of the 2025 season after taking first-round exits at the Australian Open and the Qatar TotalEnergies Open, two tournaments she’s won in the past. Despite feeling adrift on court, the two-time Grand Slam champion was as incisive as ever in her post-match press conference in assessing her form and the key to maintaining mental wellness as a pro athletes:

Q. You're known for your mental toughness when you're playing. There's a bit of talk at the moment, especially in Dubai, talking about mental wellness. How do you find that balance of being strong, determined, fighting, but still having that internal piece?

VICTORIA AZARENKA: Yeah, I wouldn't recommend professional sports for mental wellness definitely (smiling). I'm not sure that's where you go. I think you go to, like, padel or something like that for mental wellness, not professional sports (laughter).

I think what's important is to be able to kind of find the balance of the outside, your outside environment, which is not easy. I think for me it's been tough to travel. It's not even to compete, it's to be able to travel, to change places from one to another. It's pretty rigorous schedule.

I think throughout my career, I've always found something else that I'm interested in. I felt that I've really opened up myself to a lot of different things and opportunities, like doing art, doing horse riding, doing music, doing this, doing that. I think those outlets help me to continue my career.

I've been playing for 20 years professionally now. In one way it feels like it's been very quick. In the same time like, ‘God, it's been so long. Why am I still doing that (smiling)?’

I think, yeah, if you are able to kind of find outlets. Being a professional athlete, the career is not that long. If you can develop yourself as a person, kind of broaden your horizon in things, I think that would be very helpful.

Though Azarenka doesn’t plan to take advantage of Dubai’s horseback riding tours, the former world No. 1 will hope to parlay the momentum she did get from defeating Kalinina into a daunting challenge against No. 2 seed Iga Swiatek—Swiatek leads that head-to-head, 3-1 and has won their last three matches.