Coco Gauff’s 2024 season made waves, although not with out its challenges. The American tennis star confronted a sequence of ups and downs, battling by difficulties to finish the yr on a excessive notice.
She lifted the WTA Finals title and, surprisingly, completed the yr with larger earnings than her rivals, Aryna Sabalenka and Iga Swiatek.
The yr began promisingly for Gauff as she reached the semifinals on the Australian Open and produced regular ends in different main tournaments.
Nonetheless, after a semifinal loss to Swiatek at Roland Garros, Gauff’s kind dipped. Her serve turned inconsistent, which in flip affected her general recreation. She could not defend her titles in Cincinnati and New York, as Sabalenka emerged because the dominant pressure on the American hardcourt swing.
To show issues round, Gauff parted methods along with her former coach Brad Gilbert and started working with Matt Daly. The outcomes have been rapid. She ended a prolonged title drought on the China Open after which capped off her season with an unbelievable triumph on the WTA Finals in Riyadh.
Though she did not win a Grand Slam this year-unlike Sabalenka and Swiatek-who every secured a serious title, Gauff nonetheless achieved vital success by way of earnings.
On-court struggles have not hindered Gauff’s earnings
In line with Sportico, Gauff topped the record of the highest-paid feminine athletes of 2024, incomes a complete of 430 million in prize cash and endorsements. This spectacular determine positioned her forward of Swiatek ($21.4 million) and Sabalenka ($17.7 million).
A significant a part of Gauff’s monetary success got here from her record-breaking win in Riyadh, the place she earned a career-high prize of $4.81 million-the largest prize within the historical past of ladies’s tennis.
When Gauff gained the WTA Finals, she was shocked by the scale of her prize cash. After her three-set comeback victory over Qinwen Zheng within the remaining, Gauff shared her shock with the group.
“I did not know, like I knew it was some cash, however I did not know that a lot. Oh gosh, I hope I am like one of many highest-paid feminine tennis gamers this yr or athletes in order that’ll be thrilling. I needed to win this for myself. I did not know that it was the most important prize cheque on this tour,” Gauff declared.
Regardless of the challenges she confronted earlier within the season, Gauff’s monetary success and her spectacular end to 2024 have solidified her place as one of many high stars in girls’s tennis.
