Rafael Nadal is undoubtedly one of the best athletes of all time, and his retirement represents the end of an era. The Spanish legend has squeezed his body beyond its limits in order to be able to extend his career as much as possible, despite all the injuries that have affected him in the last two years.
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The former world No. 1 has seemed to be one step away from retirement several times during his career, as had happened in 2022, when his foot prevented him from playing without feeling excruciating pain. After shocking the whole world by winning the Australian Open, the Spanish champion had been forced to anesthetize his foot in order to participate in the 2022 French Open and was not even sure if he could play the first match.
The 22-time Grand Slam champion made an outstanding run in that edition of Roland Garros, defeating Novak Djokovic in the quarterfinals, Alexander Zverev in the semifinals (the German suffered a very serious ankle injury) and Casper Ruud in the final.
That was the last title won by Rafa, who put his 22nd Major on the trophy cabinet (one of the most special along with the 2022 AO). Now he will begin a new chapter of his life, in which he will be able to devote himself to his passions and spend more time with his family.
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Nike's message to Rafa
The news of Nadal's retirement - while not surprising - came as a shock to everyone. The former world No. 1 had a really significant impact on our sport and changed the dimension of tennis alongside his great rivals Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic.
On the occasion of the last event of his career - the Davis Cup Finals in Malaga - his main sponsor Nike dedicated a beautiful video to one of its most successful champions.
Although his results in 2024 were not good, Rafa had thought of playing some tournaments in 2025 as well. However, the 14-time French Open champion realized that it would not make sense to extend his career with the certainty that he could no longer be competitive at the highest level.
"I mean, I am not worried about the next chapter in my life. I have been always happy without tennis, and I had a lot of moments in my life that I was not able to play tennis because of injuries, so I spent a lot of months doing other things. Is true that during recovery so now is a different approach," The Spaniard said in his latest press conference.
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"But at the same time always accept the challenge of an important change in my life that for everyone, when you have important changes in your life, you need to accept the process and accept that the things at the beginning gonna be a little bit, I don't know if difficult, but different, and you need to respect the process, no? So I don't know how the things going to be," he continued.
Nadal has no regrets
The 22-time Grand Slam champion has not been able to play much in the last two years due to injuries, which is why he has already become accustomed to a life without tennis. The 38-year-old from Manacor has many passions and will have no difficulty occupying his days. The last part of his career recalled that of his eternal rival Roger Federer, who sent him a beautiful message before the last tournament of his career.
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The Spanish legend also revealed what he will miss most about professional tennis: I mean, probably the feeling of competition, go on court and see the fans out there, the atmosphere when you play big matches. And at the end of the day is about the adrenaline that you feel before, at the end, and during the match. Thats something that in life you have, I probably gonna have things that gonna make me happier or give me different and more important feelings, but this kind of feeling, adrenaline, its difficult to find outside of the professional sport, I think.
Many fans and insiders wonder if Nadal will continue to be involved in professional tennis even after his retirement. The prevailing feeling is that - as in the case of Federer - the Spaniard will appear in some tournaments on the ATP calendar, but he will not have a specific role and will not travel for many weeks a year.
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ATP has been making many changes in recent months and the advice of a legend like Rafa could be very useful in combining business needs with those of players.
