Dominic Thiem’s successful tennis career came to an early end during the 2024 ATP season.
Following an ongoing battle with a wrist injury, Thiem was forced into an early retirement from the sport, calling it a day at the age of 31.
The former US Open champion, who played his last tour-level match at the 2024 Vienna Open, initially suffered the injury at an ATP 250 event in Mallorca during the 2021 season.
Thiem’s setback saw his ranking plummet as he was sidelined for nine months, and despite a brief return to the top 100 after his comeback, he never reached the top level he once achieved.
Discussing his career in a recent interview on the Von Nix Kommt Nix podcast, the Austrian revealed that he made a ‘mistake’ when coming back from injury.
Dominic Thiem recalls the return from his wrist injury in 2024
Thiem said: “The injury didn’t come out of the blue. I was almost 28 years old and had been putting my wrist through a lot of strain since I was 10 or 11, so for almost 17 years. So it’s been through a lot.
“Therefore, it’s not such a huge surprise that the injury occurred. Moreover, this is an extremely typical injury for a tennis player. I think that more people have had the injury than have never had it.
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“But it was still my first serious injury. I think the longest I had been out was three weeks because I slightly twisted my ankle, and that was an extreme change.
“I pretty much made a lot of mistakes. I started again far too soon, not giving the body time to heal, to regenerate the wrist, which was of course due to a lack of experience with injuries.
“As a competitive athlete, I think you know that you control your body incredibly precisely and immediately know when something serious just happened, and that was simply the case at that moment when the wrist injury occurred.
“Immediately, I thought, ‘Oh, this is going to be a long-term story’. The wrist is so sensitive, and with my playing style, especially with the forehand, the wrist was more important than I think for many other players.
“There are so many little nerves, and it is, after all, the last point of contact between the body and the racket. That was very difficult back then, a very difficult experience.”
Dominic Thiem’s results at Grand Slam events in his career
Thiem’s prime fell towards the end of the ‘big three era’ when Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal were still dominating the game.
Despite this, Thiem managed to reach four Grand Slam finals, with his first two major title bouts coming at Roland Garros in 2018 and 2019.
He fell to Nadal on both occasions and then lost to Djokovic in the 2020 Australian Open final, narrowly missing out in a brutal five-setter.
At the US Open in 2020, Thiem finally went all the way on one of the four biggest stages in tennis, after coming back from two sets down against Alexander Zverev to clinch the title.
Aside from his appearances in Grand Slam championship matches, Thiem recorded semifinal finishes at Roland Garros in 2016 and 2017.
Thiem never advanced past the fourth round at the Wimbledon championships.
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