“I’m very happy to play Petra, and I really want to congratulate her,” Gracheva said. “She had a child,” which is “very inspiring for sport athletes.”
It’s also a return that almost certainly wouldn’t have happened 20, or even 10, years ago. The demands of pro tennis and motherhood traditionally didn’t mix; when Evonne Goolagong Cawley won Wimbledon in 1980, she was the first mom to take home a Grand Slam title in 66 years. But changes to WTA rules over the past decade—including allowing players to use their pre-pregnancy rankings at 12 events—have helped make the dual role more plausible. There are close to 20 moms playing today. Caroline Wozniacki came back in 2023, Naomi Osaka in 2024, and Belinda Bencic in 2025. Kvitova says she was inspired by the younger Bencic and Osaka, but that she’s in a somewhat different position because of her age.
“I don’t expect anything, basically,” Kvitova told wtatennis.com last month. “I’m here—that’s already a big deal for me…I tried to explain to everybody that I came back because I love it. I miss tennis, I love tennis itself since I was 4.”
She also said that, from a mental perspective, traveling with a family can have its advantages. There’s less down time and alone time—which means there’s less time to be bored, less time to be lonely, less time to obsess over your next match or the state of your game.
