Emma Raducanu: ‘I plan to do some damage next year’

When Emma Raducanu won the US Open in 2021 – aged just 18 – her parents weren’t even there. No-one had expected her – an unseeded teenager, ranked 150th in the world – to win, so it wasn’t until she flew home to Bromley, Kent that she celebrated.

‘I remember pulling up and seeing paparazzi outside my house,’ she recalls of the moment she became the first British woman to win a major singles tennis title in 44 years – not to mention the first ever qualifier. ‘It was crazy, but as soon as I went inside to my family and friends, everything felt pretty relaxed. My mum had made dumplings, and we all sat around the table chatting. I didn’t want to do anything fancy or outrageous, I just wanted to enjoy and spend quality time with people I can really be myself with.’

The day of our Zoom call – which Emma joins in her bedroom, fresh from hot yoga – is just over three years since that historic victory. She’s now 21, and while most of us were probably still navigating the world of sticky-floored nightclubs at her age, Emma has been busy with ten-hour training days, managing an injury-ridden 2023, and working on lucrative commercial deals with the likes of HSBC, Nike and Evian.

Prior to her – seemingly overnight – rise to notoriety, Emma attended Newstead Wood School, an all-girls grammar school that I (also Bromley-raised) was so desperate to attend, I convinced my parents to move to the road parallel. Much to their dismay, I failed the entry exam, but having spent years watching the gaggles of girls hanging out outside the local newsagents and in the park, I wonder if Emma – who ‘always had training to go to’ – ever felt she missed out.

‘There were certain moments where I felt envy – like when there were parties that I couldn’t go to, but at the end of the day, I didn’t know any different. You don’t miss what you don’t know. I knew I wanted to be the best and I knew what I needed to do to get there, so I didn’t think of it as a sacrifice. Newstead is pretty demanding, so it wasn’t like I could take it easy off the court, either. I put all my time into tennis or school, but it was good to have those two different worlds: school and tennis. Each was a break from the other.’

I remember once reading a forum that said Emma ‘will make a success of anything she does’. I’ve always believed this to be true – she got into Newstead, after all – and everything she says as we chat lends credence to the theory.

When, in 2023, she made the decision to have surgery on both her wrists and ankles to treat a condition known as carpal bosses, where bony bumps rub together and cause chronic pain – leaving her in a mobility scooter and unable to shower or brush her teeth – she utilised the time to ‘get herself in a better position for the year ahead’. That meant spending six weeks with her family in China, learning how to get her Chinese language ‘perfect’, reading (Chinese philosophical classic I Ching is her current book of choice), and visiting HSBC graduate students to talk about her accomplishments.

‘[Recovering from surgery] made me realise how much I rely on physical movement for wellness, and I did go through the initial phase of, “Oh, this is really tough,” but then you just have to get up and crack on, really,’ she adds.

To say Emma is wise beyond her years would be an understatement, but she doesn’t call all the shots. Her support system – namely, mum Renee Zhai, and coach Nick Cavaday, who she re-recruited in January this year, after working together in Emma’s early teenage years – always have a say when it comes to making career choices, like going ahead with the aforementioned surgery. Or like when, during Wimbledon this year, she decided against competing with Andy Murray in the mixed doubles due to wrist pain, to prioritise her involvement in the singles. ‘My mum is a big pillar of mine in all senses – professional and personal,’ she says. ‘She knows me inside out, it’s kind of freaky, so I go to her a lot. She’s my best friend.’

‘When it comes to tennis and work, I talk to my coach a lot – and my doctor – but I definitely challenge their points, too. Recently, HSBC did a survey that showed 45 per cent of people said they made a better decision when consulting other people, and I definitely think that rings true.’

Resilience is Emma’s middle name at this point. She’s enduring yet another injury when we speak, after spraining ligaments in her foot during the Korea Open in September. As I write this, she’s just announced her subsequent withdrawal from the WTA tournament in China – and yet, I don’t detect even a hint of defeatism.

‘There has been a lot of volatility over the past three years,’ she says. ‘And I think the most I’ve come into myself has been in the last few weeks. One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is non-attachment; acknowledging that everything comes and goes. Every moment is fleeting, and how you interact with the present dictates how you feel, the quality of your work, the quality of your relationships, and how much the people around you enjoy being with you.

‘I’ve taught myself not to label things as black or white. For example, with this injury, I’m trying to catch myself and stop labelling it as like, “Oh, I’m so unlucky, this is so bad.” I’ve learnt to accept things and reframe them. I’m not completely unable to exercise, so I’ll still do things like yoga or Pilates – low-impact exercise, so I’m focusing on that. I’ve matured a lot in the last few weeks, to be honest.’

Despite such turbulence, she’s still managed to climb the rankings from outside the top 200 to 57th – and while her late formative years weren’t exactly conventional, you could argue they were more defining than most. ‘Having been through such big changes, wellness to me now is the inner stillness I feel,’ Emma says. ‘For me, that might mean doing hot yoga, reading, learning, studying – anything to cultivate my mind. I take confidence from doing things that really enrich my mind and body and how peaceful I feel.’ Has this influenced her approach to tennis? ‘Yeah, I’m prepared to work hard and do some damage next year.’ The ball’s in your court, Emma.