Caroline Wozniacki will not participate in WTA Tour's Middle East swing in February

2018 Australian Open champion Caroline Wozniacki is planning her 2024 season carefully. She announced her return to tennis in June 2023 with the main goal of competing in big tournaments including Grand Slams and the 2024 Paris Olympics.

The 33-year-old Wozniacki has already announced one major adjustment to her schedule. After the Australian Open, she will not participate in the Middle East swing of the WTA Tour in February. She will skip the WTA 1000 tournaments in Doha and Dubai and rejoin the tour in March at Indian Wells.

This is a wise decision for her. Wozniacki talked about how her rheumatoid arthritis affected her physical and mental health when she was previously on the tour. That diagnosis in 2018 which she originally thought was the flu, contributed to her initial retirement from the game in 2020. Since then, she has learned more about the autoimmune disorder so she is better equipped to handle the rigors of professional tennis. Part of her enhanced understanding is to give her body the necessary breaks it needs to get through an 11-month season filled with travel and training.

Caroline Wozniacki is focused on the Australian Open

In the meantime, Wozniacki has a laser focus on the Australian Open. This tournament has always had special significance for her; it is where she became a Grand Slam champion in 2018 and is also where she concluded the first act of her career in 2020.

This is her second Grand Slam since she returned. She lost in the fourth round of the US Open to eventual champion Coco Gauff. That is a confidence booster for the Dane.

Wozniacki, Karolina Pliskova, Victoria Azarenka, and Angelique Kerber are the thirty-somethings on the WTA tour that continues to be infiltrated with a youth movement of players 25 and under. From which group will the 2024 Australian Open champion come from? We will soon find out.

Read more from Lob and Smash