Taylor Townsend is the best women’s doubles player in the world right now. But back in 2012, at age 16, she was told that her body wasn’t fit enough for professional tennis.
“It was an official from the USTA. (That’s like being called to the principal’s office.) They said, ‘Taylor, you need to come to Florida — now. We’re putting you on an eight-week block of fitness training,'” Townsend wrote in a 2021 essay from The Player’s Tribune.
Eight weeks of intensive fitness training meant that she’d miss the US Open, despite being the No. 1 ranked junior in the world. Nothing about the feedback made sense to her. At the time, Townsend already felt like an outsider in the world of tennis, being a young, Black girl from the South Side of Chicago. Now, it felt like her weight was another alienating factor being used to keep her from reaching her dreams. This rang truer for Townsend after it was discovered during the fitness intensive that her “health problems” were due to anemia. And still, she was being told she couldn’t compete.
“When I was going through all this stuff, there was no body-positivity movement. It didn’t exist like how it does now.”
Townsend, however, doesn’t take kindly to the word “no” — especially not when it comes to others telling her what she’s capable of. So with her guaranteed spots secured in the juniors draw, Townsend raised the money and funded herself to compete in New York, ultimately making it to the quarters in singles and winning in doubles. Now looking back on that experience, Townsend says she wouldn’t wish it on anyone. But it also made her the player she is today.
“When I was going through all this stuff, there was no body-positivity movement. It didn’t exist like how it does now. The conversations didn’t exist,” she tells Popsugar in an exclusive interview in partnership with the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA). “It was like very much, here’s the box — you need to fit in it . . . it was very black and white.”
Fast forward to 2025, Townsend has made a name for herself in the tennis world for doing things her way. As a power lefty, she’s amassed two Grand Slam doubles titles (2024 Wimbledon, 2025 Australian Open) and ten WTA Tour doubles titles, several of which she won post-maternity leave. Plus, two singles titles and two junior doubles Grand Slams. Yet, some people in the tennis world still seem to question her place.
At the US Open on Aug. 27, after losing to Townsend in a singles match 7-5, 6-1, Latvian player Jelena Ostapenko made some loaded statements, telling Townsend she has “no education, no class.” The reason? Ostapenko thought Townsend should have apologized for a shot that clipped the top of the net but stayed in play, known as a net cord. Townsend told her she did not have to apologize and that she could “learn how to take a loss better,” per The Athletic.
When asked in a post-game press conference about Ostapenko’s charged words, Townsend responded with the same energy she did at 16, pointing to her intended actions, not her words.
“She told me I have no class, no education, and to see what happens when we get outside the US. I’m looking forward to it,” she said in a post-game interview on the court. When asked if she would consider the comments dog whistles, Townsend elaborated: “Saying I have no education and no class, I don’t really take that personally because I know it’s so far from the truth. The thing that I’m the most proud of is that I let my racquet talk.”
“She’s packed up and she’s gone. I’m here, and that’s the only thing that matters,” Townsend continued. “The only thing that I’m worried about right now is continuing to move forward through this tournament. I know that I’m a fantastic tennis player, and I know that I have a lot of things that I want to accomplish, and this is another stepping stone.”
That experience back in 2012 — and every challenge she’s overcome since — has helped give Townsend the thick skin and strong voice she has today. “I had grown up in an environment where everyone else was telling me how I should be, how I should play, who I should be, what I should do, and that’s all that I heard,” she says of her early career. And while that felt limiting at the time, it also taught her how to listen to her own voice. “I had to break through that so that I could hear my own voice and be able to understand the person that I am, the kind of player that I am, the kind of game that I want to play, and how I showed up,” she adds.
Even today, looking back on her decision to go public about the discrimination and body shaming she experienced as a teen, Townsend expresses pride. That was the first time she stood up and made a decision for herself in the tennis world regarding how she wanted to respond to a situation, she says: “I decided, I’m going to use my voice, I’m going to talk about it, even if it hurts or even if it’s embarrassing. I’m just going to do it.”
It’s clear in this moment that Townsend also knows the world is watching. And she’s already a step ahead, having figured out long ago how to cut through the chatter to ensure that her message and her voice is heard, especially for the younger players who look just like her.
“I understand the power of representation and the power of being able to see it, to believe it. So for me, I would just keep doing what I’m doing, speaking to them, leading by action,” Townsend says. For Townsend, that means never apologizing for who are or the talents you posses, a lesson she learned long ago.
“I’m just gonna keep doing me,” she says.
Alexis Jones (she/her) is the senior health and fitness editor at PS. In her seven years of editorial experience, Alexis has developed passions and areas of expertise around mental health, women’s health and fitness, racial and ethnic disparities in healthcare, and chronic conditions. Prior to joining PS, she was the senior editor at Health magazine. Her other bylines can be found at Women’s Health, Prevention, Marie Claire, and more.
