Iga Swiatek: Tennis star to donate $50,000 prize money to World Mental Health Day
The world No. 4 took lower than an hour to breeze by means of her third-round match towards Veronika Kudermetova and advised reporters after the match that it was necessary that individuals stayed open-minded about their psychological well being.
“I’d say in sports activities, for me, it was all the time necessary to make use of that form of assist as a result of I all the time thought that in my psychological toughness there’s some energy that I can use on court docket and I may also develop in that method,” she mentioned.
“However I additionally know all people has totally different paths, and it is nice that we are able to select our path as a result of I do know that there are individuals who additionally do not want psychologists.”
World Psychological Well being Day is well known on October 10, with many athletes and governing our bodies launching campaigns to lift consciousness.
The psychological stress that athletes cope with frequently has come underneath the highlight much more this yr, with excessive profile stars comparable to Naomi Osaka and Simone Biles revealing the struggles they’ve needed to undergo when competing at an elite degree.
Sunday was a yr to the day that Swiatek received her first — and at the moment solely — grand slam on the delayed French Open.
After profitable in Roland Garros, the 20-year-old from Poland revealed that utilizing a sports activities psychologist had helped her recover from the road.
Swiatek was unseeded forward of that slam and, at solely 19, hadn’t been enjoying her finest within the build-up to the match.
It was a turnaround in fortunes she partly credited to her sports activities psychologist Daria Abramowicz.
Swiatek says her charitable donation this week was impressed by Venus Williams who has labored alongside the Ladies’s Tennis Affiliation (WTA) to arrange a program to supply $2 million of free remedy to the general public.
“It is simply good to remain open-minded. In case you want that form of assist, then go for it. In case you’re as much as it and if you happen to’re open-minded, I feel it helps lots,” Swiatek added.
