Rafael Nadal has decided not to participate in the U.S. Open due to concerns about his fitness, the Spaniard said on Wednesday (August 7) in a social media post, adding his next event will be the Laver Cup in late September.
For Nadal, who won the most recent of his four U.S. Open titles in 2019, this marks the second consecutive year he has sat out the year’s final Grand Slam.
The 22-times Grand Slam winner competed at the Paris Olympics where he lost to eventual champion Novak Djokovic in the second round of the singles competition and reached the quarter-finals of the doubles with Carlos Alcaraz.
The 38-year-old former world number one has fallen to 159th in the rankings after struggling for two years with injuries and against Djokovic at the Olympics suffered one of his worst losses in a 6-1 6-4 defeat.
Nadal sat out the Australian Open in January after suffering a small muscle tear during his comeback from a long injury layoff and in May crashed to his earliest French Open exit when he lost in the first round.
The Spaniard skipped Wimbledon to prepare for the Paris Olympics where the tennis event was played on the clay courts at Roland Garros where he celebrated 14 French Open titles.
