“In the future, I’ll try to look at the bigger picture”: Holger Rune’s shocking lessons from his forced break

Holger Rune has been away from the Tour for 110 days. Almost four months ago, the Dane suffered a complicated injury during the Stockholm Open last October, when he faced Frenchman Ugo Humbert in the semifinals, and a fall ended up causing a rupture of the Achilles tendon, the most complicated injury of his career.

The Dane was fighting for a spot in the tournament final and still held hopes of entering the top 10 in the final part of the season – and even of potentially qualifying for the ATP Finals. However, the season came to an abrupt halt, and Rune had to resign himself to a long period away from the courts.

“It was very unexpected. I didn’t know quite what happened when it happened, but after that the first focus was what to do now and how to move forward,” Rune said in a recent interview with ATPTour.com. “Luckily everything went really well. My surgeon did an amazing job, the physios are great and my team is really good.”

The 22-year-old player underwent surgery a few days later and, after a couple of weeks of absolute rest, Rune quickly returned to the gym to work on his recovery, gradually walking again and stepping back onto a tennis court. “My time has actually been really busy, which is nice,” Rune explained. “I’ve had a very tight schedule because there are so many things to do in the rehab. It keeps me occupied during the time off.

“Right after the injury, I really needed rest anyway. I was at the end of the season and ready for a vacation, just not in this way. The first two weeks in the cast went really quickly. I was relaxing, going to the gym a little bit, and it was nice to have time off. After that it became more intense. I never thought it would be forever. I’m really young and healing really fast so far, which is good.”

After about a month, Rune was already able to stand on the tennis court, although still very limited in movements. With persistence, the former world No. 4 has worked intensively on his recovery and is already seeing promising improvements.

“It’s amazing, especially now that I’m hitting on two legs,” Rune said. “It’s starting to feel really nice. Before it was nice too, but it’s not quite the same when you know what you’re capable of. Now it’s more fun because I can actually put some energy behind the ball.

“There’s still a lot of rehab to do, but just being back on the tennis court is really nice. I think it’s going to be helpful when I come back that I’ve kept the swing and everything going, because we don’t want other injuries from too much time off. So far I think we’ve used our time the right way.”

While ATP players competed during January in the Aussie swing, with the Australian Open as the big event at the start of the season, Rune was forced for the first time since his US Open 2021 debut to miss a Grand Slam main draw. Instead of traveling to Australia as in previous years, he had more time to stay home in Denmark and spend time with his close ones.

“It’s nice to be more with family and close friends,” Rune said. “We don’t really get that chance normally. I have watched a lot of films, especially at the beginning after the surgery. I was on the sofa with the leg up watching Netflix and some James Bond as well. Now I’ve been to a football game, watched other sports and tried to occupy my brain with things other than tennis. I watched Formula 1 when I was in Qatar, too."

“I have always been competing since I was young. Always eager to win and fight. I had that dragon inside me on court. I still have it. This injury is a moment to show myself how much strength I have and how much I’m willing to put into it. I miss the adrenaline and competitiveness, even at home doing gym exercises or small games just to feel it again. I am getting my competitiveness out that way.”

The Dane acknowledged in the interview that he especially misses the atmosphere of competing in a stadium full of fans. “That’s one of the parts I miss most, performing on court and feeling the support,” the 22-year-old added. “I’ve also had nice messages from a lot of players. Even though we’re competitors, we’re colleagues and want the best for each other,” Rune said.

Rune’s injury is especially complicated and can even end athletes’ careers. Since the severity of the injury became known, there were more doubts than certainties regarding a potential return date.

“We searched a lot. With Achilles injuries, most studies are on older people, and many don’t have surgery and recovery can be a year,” Rune said. “But for athletes it’s different and quicker as we have the surgery. Surgery was the most natural thing for me to speed up the process in a healthy way.”

“One football player reached out to me. He had the same injury and was back after four and a half months,” added the former Paris Masters champion. “There are strict guidelines and you can’t skip steps. I’m strong and young, so I believe I’ll recover quickly, but it takes hard work and smart work.”

While Rune spends time away from competition focused on his recovery, he has had an opportunity to pause from the hectic life of a tennis player and view his long-term objectives more calmly. “When you play every week, you don’t really stop to assess things,” Rune said. “I think it’s about managing tournaments better and listening more to my body. Sometimes you push too much, and now it was too much for my body.”

Among the lessons is working with long-term goals in mind, and not submitting oneself to pressure to play too many tournaments and overload physically. “In the future, I’ll try to look at the bigger picture, not just the next goal, but how I feel physically and mentally,” added Holger Rune. “I think that is important for my longer-term aims. But this break, I have had a chance to look back.”

Rune had a solid 2025, winning the ATP 500 title in Barcelona – defeating Carlos Alcaraz in the final – and reaching a new Masters 1000 final at Indian Wells – although he fell to Jack Draper. “It meant a lot [to win Barcelona]. Paris is still my most memorable win, but every title is special. Last season that was the perfect week, and Indian Wells [final] was also a great week.”

Without a clear return date, Rune views his recovery process with optimism and announces that he eagerly anticipates his return to competition. For now, he is already on the tennis courts hitting balls and doing strength work to rebuild muscle and gradually get back to peak form. “I’m so excited to get back,” Rune said. “In training now, I can really put energy behind the ball again and it feels amazing. I’m looking forward to it and I think I’ll come back stronger and hopefully have many more perfect weeks in my career.”