Serena Williams dropped a bombshell when she announced over the weekend that she won’t be going to the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
“I’m actually not on the Olympic list. … Not that I’m aware of. If so, then I shouldn’t be on it,” the tennis superstar said during her pre-Wimbledon press conference where she’s going for her 24th Grand Slam singles title at Wimbledon.
“There’s a lot of reasons that I made my Olympic decision,” she added. “I don’t really want to — I don’t feel like going into them today. Maybe another day. Sorry.”
When asked how she’ll feel sitting out of the summer games, she said, “I have not thought about it. In the past, it’s been a wonderful place for me. I really haven’t thought about it, so I’m going to keep not thinking about it.
“The 39-year-old has four Olympic gold medals already from past summer games. At the 2012 London Games she won gold in singles and then took home the gold with twin sister Venus at the 2000 Sydney Games and 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Serena didn’t medal at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, losing in the third round of singles to Elina Svitolina of Ukraine.
But she’s not the only tennis star who is choosing to skip the Tokyo Olympics. Rafael Nadal and Dominic Thiem also announced their decision already to not participate in this year’s summer games.
Serena hasn’t been busy just playing tennis, she’s also been coaching her 3-year-old daughter Alexis Olympia to be a pro on the court.
The grand slam champion recently shared a series of Instagram videos of the duo having a mommy-daughter training season. She shared words of wisdom and even revealed some secrets that her dad and tennis coach taught her as a kid.
Serena and husband Alexis Ohanian welcomed daughter Alexis in September 2017 and tied the knot a few months later in November of the same year.
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