How Maja Chwalinska Stepped out of the Darkness
Before a dream run at Roland Garros, the shock French Open finalist spoke candidly about her struggles with depression.
PARIS, France — When 2024 gold medalist Zheng Qinwen was bageled in the first round of the French Open 10 days ago, it was bemoaned as a rough loss for her, a stark indication of how far she’d fallen from her Olympic heights. When 21st-ranked Elise Mertens was bageled in the second round, screenshots of scoreboards circulated with captions like “Yikes, Elise.” When former WTA No. 3 Maria Sakkari lost her third-round match in three sets after winning the first set 6-1, similar laments were heard.
Only with some hindsight did a pattern emerge. It’s taken some time for the tennis cognoscenti to recognize what they’ve been witnessing from Maja Chwalinska, the woman who beat all the aforementioned players and then another three players for good measure. It’s been a wild two weeks for Chwalinska—well, three weeks, perhaps, if you count that her tournament started during qualifying.
But even with hindsight, her star turn is largely baffling. Even for a French Open that has been full of upsets, there’s been nothing anywhere near as shocking as the finalist who has emerged from the top half of the women’s singles draw.
Maja Chwalinska is a Polish 24-year-old ranked 114th, which is just one spot behind her previous career-high ranking of 113th. This tournament is only the eighth tour-level main draw appearance of Chwalinska’s career, and the first time she’s won more than two matches in any of those main draws.
Emma Raducanu, famously, was the only other player to have reached a major final as a qualifier. But Raducanu had considerably more momentum and name recognition when she arrived to that 2021 U.S. Open, having reached the fourth round of Wimbledon a month earlier. Chwalinska was a name on no one’s lips this year, meaningfully.
But at Roland Garros Chwalinska has won with guile and style, over and over again, cementing her spot in the French Open final with a 7-6(4), 6-4 semifinal win over Diana Shnaider on Thursday afternoon. On Saturday, Chwalinska will face teen prodigy Mirra Andreeva for an improbable major title.
The run had me dusting off an old audio file, looking for buried treasure: I interviewed Chwalinska at Wimbledon back in 2022, which was the first of her seven previous tour-level main draw appearances. I was working on my book about Naomi Osaka then, and Chwalinska’s striking openness about speaking about her own struggles with depression made her one of the players most equipped to discuss the topic of mental health in tennis.
That vintage interview, plus more from Chwalinska on and off the court on Thursday at Roland Garros, is available after the jump for Bounces subscribers. There are only a few days left in the 15 percent off sale on Bounces subscriptions, so if you haven’t taken advantage of that deal yet please don’t delay!
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