World No. 1 Iga Swiatek has announced her split with coach of three years Tomas Wiktorowski. Swiatek won four Grand Slam titles — three consecutive French Opens and one U.S. Open — with Wiktorowski.
A couple of hours later, she withdrew from the Wuhan Open WTA 1000 tournament, which begins Saturday October 5.
“After an important change in my sports team, I decided to withdraw from the tournament in Wuhan,” she said in a statement sent to The Athletic shortly after confirming her parting ways with Wiktorowski.
“I’m really sorry for fans in China and those who wait to see me play, but I hope you understand that I need some time. My team and I are taking the time to make this transition as best as we can.”
Swiatek also withdrew from the China Open WTA 1000 in Beijing citing “personal matters.” That tournament concludes this weekend.
“After 3 years of the greatest achievements in my career, together with my coach Tomasz Wiktorowski we decided to part ways,” Swiatek said of her former coach in a statement published on Instagram, Friday October 4.
“I want to start with a big thank you and appreciating our work together,” she said. Swiatek won 19 of her 22 WTA titles in partnership with Wiktorowski, and has spent 123 weeks as world No. 1, recently overtaking Ash Barty to move seventh on the list of women’s players with most weeks at the top of the rankings. She won 37 matches in a row in 2022, the longest WTA winning streak since 2000, but has not reached a Grand Slam semifinal outside the French Open since 2022 in Australia.
In her statement, she credited Wiktorowski for “changes and a fresh approach to my game.” Those changes focussed on harnessing the incredible power and spin of her groundstrokes, especially her forehand, and making it easier for her to harness them repeatedly and efficiently.
By imposing those qualities on opponents, no matter their gamestyle or level, Swiatek found incredible success. More recently, she has made adjustments to her serve, boosting its average speed and effectiveness by abbreviating her motion since the start of 2024.
More recently, her losses, still infrequent, have looked more alike. Swiatek has been unable to reverse momentum swings with in-game tactical adjustments, and has become susceptible to strings of increasingly wild errors, especially on her usually reliable forehand. Despite having some of the most prodigious topspin production on the tour, she has a tendency to pummel even a high quality incoming ball, instead of adding shape to reset a rally or even put her opponent under a different kind of pressure.
Wiktorowski all but eliminated Swiatek’s breakout gamestyle, which was heavier on variety and all-court play, to great effect. In those losses, some of those tactics which she once deployed regularly were not at her fingertips when they may have helped turn things around.
Swiatek follows Coco Gauff, Elena Rybakina, and Naomi Osaka, who have all chosen to split with coaches with which they won Grand Slam titles in recent weeks.
‘The most drastic step Swiatek has taken’
Analysis from tennis writer Charlie Eccleshare
After a testing few months, this is the most drastic step that the best women’s player in the world has taken to rediscover her best form.
Swiatek has enjoyed huge success with Tomasz Wiktorowski, but since winning the French Open in June she has gone through some turbulence. After comfortably winning the first set of her Wimbledon third-round match against Yulia Putintseva, she had no answer to the Kazakh playing out of her skin for the next two. As world No. 1, playing a peaking opponent happens sometimes, but the manner of the defeat, in which Swiatek first struggled to stem a tide, then nosedived into a string of errors, has become more familiar in recent times.
In elite tennis, three years is also a long time for a player to stay with a coach, and there’s a sense that some new ideas might be needed. The split is said to have been very civil, as underlined by Swiatek’s post on social media. In that post she also spoke of being in talks with foreign coaches (having previously always worked with fellow Poles), and her choice for Wiktorowski’s replacement will be fascinating.
One name suggested by tennis insiders during conversations on Friday morning was Wim Fissette, who recently split with Osaka and has coached the Japanese, Kim Clijsters and Angelique Kerber to Grand Slam titles.
Some in Poland believe Swiatek might benefit from having a couple of new coaches – one to iron out a few technical kinks in her game, and the other in more of a supercoach, mentoring role. This has been the blend favoured by a number of players, especially on the ATP side, over the last few years. For Wiktorowski, the decision makes sense as well, given his desire to spend a bit more time at home. He coached Agnieszka Radwanska for seven years before Swiatek, as well as coaching Olga Danilovic in between, so it’s been a pretty relentless period for him.
There’s an increasing feeling that reinjecting a little of the variety that served Swiatek so well in her first year on the tour would help her, especially away from clay.
Either way, today’s announcement and the decision to withdraw from both Beijing and Wuhan when the world No. 1 race is so tight show that Swiatek is prioritising the long term. At the U.S. Open she bristled at the idea of taking a break to help manage the mental and physical burnout she has spoken about in the past, but it appears she has decided that some time off and a chance to reflect and make some changes is necessary.
(Photo: Robert Prange / Getty Images)
