Jessica Pegula tops Iga Swiatek in Bad Homburg for third title of 2025

Jessica Pegula will head into Wimbledon with a grass-court title in her pocket for the second straight year. The world No. 3 delivered a comprehensive performance to defeat former world No. 1 iga Swiatek in the final of the Bad Homburg Open on Saturday 6-4, 7-5 to earn her third title of 2025, and second of her career on grass.

The champion in Berlin last year, Pegula bounced back after losing her first match of her title defense there with a run to a different German grass-court trophy, adding to victories earlier this year on hard courts in Austin and green clay in Charleston.

Pegula said in the aftermath of her semifinal victory against Linda Noskova on Friday—where she escaped in three sets after Noskova served for the match—that she hoped to leverage the surfact in her first grass-court match against Swiatek. She did that expertly over one hour and 46 minutes, faced just one break point (which she saved), and found her best level late in each set to deny the five-time Grand Slam champion a milestone win.

After three-set victories in her quarterfinal and semifinal matches, she redirected pace expertly against Swiatek to beat the Pole for the fourth time in their last six matches.

Though Pegula hit half Swiatek's total of winners, 15 to 30, she also kept her unforced error count down. She struck 16, while Swiatek totaled a whopping 39. And while Swiatek hit nine aces, Pegula won a higher percentage of both first and second serve points than Swiatek.

Swiatek was bidding to win her first title since Roland Garros last June in her maiden grass-court final -- a surface that the five-time Grand Slam champion has historically struggled to master. Her semifinal win against reigning Wimbledon finalist Jasmine Paolini on Friday was her 50th career Top 10 win, but first on the surface.

"This tournament showed that there is hope for me on grass," Swiatek said in her runner-up speech.

Pegula agreed.

"I know you say you can't play on grass, but trust me, you're still very, very good on grass," Pegula said in her victory speech, "so cut yourself some slack there."