By CNN
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A year after she was confined to a mobility scooter having undergone multiple surgeries, British tennis player Emma Raducanu says she feels “really healthy” ahead of the grass-court season.
The 2021 US Open champion was sidelined for eight months last year as she recovered from surgery on both of her wrists and one of her ankles.
Now ranked no. 208 in the world, the 21-year-old Raducanu has played more regularly this year but missed the French Open to focus on building fitness.
“I had a cast on one hand, a splint on the other and my ankle was pretty much immobilized,” Raducanu said on Monday in relation to her recovery from last year’s surgeries, per the WTA.
“I was just scooting around on one knee. As someone who’s so active, it was very difficult to just shut your body down. It’s very easy for me to lose sight of where I was exactly a year ago, to this day, to this month. You just get so caught up in your own world, you want more, more, more.”
Raducanu will begin her grass-court campaign against Japan’s Ena Shibahara in Nottingham, England this week in preparation for Wimbledon – the third grand slam of the year – which begins on July 1.
She said that she now has “zero apprehension” when hitting balls or thinking about her schedule having spent recent weeks conditioning her body.
“It was important for me to take time to transition on to the grass, because the balls over the grass-court season are so heavy,” Raducanu added.
“I feel like conditions are getting slower and slower on grass courts and especially for myself having had wrist surgeries, I needed to prioritize the transition.”
Since winning the US Open as an unseeded qualifier three years ago, Raducanu rose to a career-high ranking of no. 10 in the world in 2022 but has also struggled with form and fitness.
Her last competitive match was a first-round defeat against Argentina’s Maria Lourdes Carlé at the Madrid Open on April 24.
