Tennis player Holger Rune targeting seven-month return from ruptured Achilles tendon

Rune, 22, intends to belie the typical nine-to-12-month rehab period for the injury. Linnea Rheborg / Getty Images Share full articleHolger Rune intends to return to tennis in May, just seven months after tearing his left Achilles tendon. Rune suffered the injury in mid-October last year, during a semifinal against Ugo Humbert at the Nordic Open in Stockholm. On Thursday, the 22-year-old announced on Instagram that he plans to return at the Hamburg Open in Germany, which runs May 16-23. The French Open, where Rune is a two-time quarterfinalist, starts the day after the tournament in Germany ends. In a statement sent to The Athletic from a representative via text message on Thursday, Rune said: “I have been locked in on my rehab work since the start of my injury and spent hours on heavy rehab surrounded by specialists from Denmark and Aspetar (a private hospital in Doha, Qatar) and my team and I just can’t wait to be back on court now.” Rune has been determined to beat the typical nine-to-12 month recovery time for the injury since starting his rehab. That’s how long it took Kevin Durant, the future NBA Hall of Famer, to get back. Jayson Tatum, the Boston Celtics star, returned to action in March after more than 10 months out. Four-time NFL MVP Aaron Rodgers returned to New York Jets practice 77 days after his tear in 2023 and had designs on a rapid return, but did not play again for more than a year. “I am 100 percent going to be back stronger than ever,” Rune said in an interview a couple of months after suffering the injury. “I can build myself exactly how I want to when I come back.” Rune also turned his rehabilitation into an Instagram documentary, which included footage of him hitting forehands while wearing various protective boots and exhibiting various degrees of movement. He appears to have made his forehand swing more compact, which will in theory make him less rushable on that wing. Rune spent much of his recovery at the Aspetar hospital in Doha, and was there when Iran fired retaliatory missiles at U.S. bases in Qatar, following American and Israeli strikes on Tehran on February 28. In an interview with Danish channel TV2 Sport the following day, Aneke Rune — the player’s mother and manager — said: “It’s been a wild night. We didn’t get much sleep. It all seems more brutal at night with the fireballs in the sky and repeated explosions. “But Holger was really scared last night. There’s a lot of brutal news and pictures of attacks all around us.” Rune returned to his home in Monaco in early March, posting on March 11: “Back in Monaco. The rehab is progressing amazingly every day #comebackloading.” Rune, an almost direct peer of Carlos Alcaraz (both turn 23 in the next month) was initially tipped to be a rival for the Spaniard. But where Alcaraz has already won seven slams, Rune has not been able to kick on after a breakthrough period a few years ago that saw him beat Novak Djokovic to win the 2022 Paris Masters, aged 19. The following year he achieved a career-high ranking of No. 4, helped by reaching two more Masters 1000 finals, the rung below the Grand Slams. Rune was No. 10 in the live rankings when he suffered the achilles injury in October, but is currently No. 29. If he does return in May, then he will be out of the world’s top 32 (which secures a seeding at the biggest events) for his first event back. Although aware of the seriousness of the injury, Rune has maintained that he will return a better player than he was before. “I’m looking forward to it and I think I’ll come back stronger and hopefully have many more perfect weeks in my career,” he told the ATP Tour in February. Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Charlie Eccleshare is a senior tennis writer for The Athletic, having previously covered soccer as the Tottenham Hotspur correspondent for five years. He joined in 2019 after five years writing about football and tennis at The Telegraph. Follow Charlie on Twitter @CDEccleshare