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The recent extension of a few events to two weeks on the tennis calendar has been pointed out by Madison Keys as one of the issues that led to players like Daria Kasatkina and Elina Svitolina finishing their seasons early. Kasatkina and Svitolina were open about the exhaustion leading to the end of their 2025 season.
After playing at the US Open, Svitolina represented Ukraine at the Billie Jean King Cup before announcing the end of her 2025 season in September. In a lengthy statement shared on her social media, she wrote:
"I’m giving myself the space I need to heal and recharge..."
Meanwhile, early in October, Kastkina also wrote a similar statement regarding the exhaustion due to the tennis calendar.
"The schedule is too much, mentally and emotionally I am at breaking point and sadly, I am not alone," Russian-born Kasatkina wrote on Instgram.
While talking about this issue on The Players; Box Podcst, Madison Keys pointed to the extension of several WTA 1000 events in the past couple of years. SHe stated that while players are not playing more tournaments, the calenda has become more demanding because many events have stretched to two weeks.
"You're at tournaments, there's more downtime in between tournaments there, and I think there's more stress of, okay, if I lose early, what am I going to do for the next 10 days? Because I have a really long time and it's not enough time to go home, but it's like maybe enough time to go somewhere else and train, but not really," she explained (from 22:20)
Even with rest days between matches, she said the schedule feels more draining overall, both physically and mentally. Notably, Keys has also not played since facing defeat in the first round at the US Open late in August.
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