Venus Williams is back with a joyous victory at the DC Open
No woman of her age had won a tour-level singles match since Martina Navratilova posted a victory at Wimbledon at 47 in 2004. But most 45-year-olds don't bring the aura of Venus Williams to the tennis court.
'The community here that supports me so much, it's like playing at home,' said Williams, who is scheduled to face Poland's Magdalena Frech in the round of 16 Thursday. 'I've been coming to D.C. for a long time. I see a lot of people — like this gentleman back here who said, 'I first met you when you were 13.' And I remember my first time coming here: I was about 13 years old.'
Before this week, Williams hadn't played a match in the past 16 months. She entered the DC Open as a wild card who seemingly wasn't supposed to advance in both the singles and doubles brackets. But with her first singles victory since August 2023, the former top-ranked player and seven-time Grand Slam singles champion made a new kind of history.
Hundreds of fans watched Williams take the court Tuesday through the screens of their phones. There were just as many videos being shot when she closed out her win. With no guarantee of when she might pop up next, these moments just had to be recorded.
Technically, the win was an upset, but the pro-Williams crowd never saw it that way. She started poorly against the 23-year-old Stearns, just as she did Monday in her first doubles match. She lost every point of the first game Tuesday, but she quickly settled in. And as she settled in, so did the crowd, which grew louder and louder as the match progressed.
As she inched closer to the win, the crowd sensed it, willing her through the marathon ninth and 10th games of the second set. Williams looked every bit of 45 at times, but she still exceeded 110 mph on her serve and recorded nine aces.
'I had to come back for the insurance — because they informed me this year that I'm on COBRA,' Williams said, drawing laughs, during the post-match on-court interview. 'So it's like, 'I got to get my benefits on.''
Before Monday's doubles match, Williams had last played at the 2024 Miami Open. Last July, Williams had surgery to remove uterine fibroids, which she said had caused her pain throughout her career. She felt the DC Open was the right time to come back. Two matches in, she is getting accustomed to match competitiveness again.
'Well, you got to win to learn to win,' she said Monday. 'You got to win to win again. Isn't that a conundrum? But in any case, it's so much work. I have been training for months to get to this moment. And then you train to be prepared to win in this moment, but it's not a guarantee.'
Williams won her doubles match with D.C. native Hailey Baptiste, 6-3, 6-1, over Eugenie Bouchard and Clervie Ngounoue. The crowd waiting to get into that match Monday afternoon stretched down the ramps of the stands and spilled onto the sidewalk below. Everyone wanted a glimpse.
The match was played on a smaller court adjacent to the main stadium. As they played, the stadium was essentially empty, but every inch of the bleachers at their court was full. Cramped on the narrow entryway, members of the hopeful runover crowd strained their necks while looking for a clear view or an empty seat.
Well, unless you're Kevin Durant.
Durant and his security guards forced their way through the blockade and to a specially cleared patch of seats. The D.C. native and NBA superstar was there for what everyone else wanted to see: the return of one of the most famous players in tennis.
'I think it's important to share those emotions,' said Williams, who will team with Baptiste to face Taylor Townsend and Shuai Zhang on Wednesday. 'To let go and to share that with the crowd and with the fans and with the world who are right there with you, you know, to see that moment of happiness in full circle.'
Holger Rune, the No. 3 seed in the men's singles draw, withdrew Tuesday before playing a match. Rune has a back injury, according to a DC Open spokesperson. The native of Denmark was in Washington practicing over the weekend, including with five-time DC Open champion Andre Agassi.
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