Dizziness contributed to the demise of both Genie Bouchard and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in Beijing today.
A tearful Bouchard took a medical time-out early in the second set of her match with Andrea Petkovic. Her blood pressure and pulse was taken before Bouchard retired with dizziness trailing the 13th-seeded German, 6-2, 1-1.
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The 2014 Wimbledon finalist is still suffering from effects of the concussion she suffered during a lockerroom fall at the US Open last month.
"Unfortunately, I did not feel well enough to finish the match," Bouchard said in a statement afterward. "It is really frustrating as I was very much looking forward to playing the China Open. I thought I was physically ready, but unfortunately the symptoms of my concussion came back."
"Really, I was focused on myself.I didn't look on the other side at all. I really didn't see it coming in that particular moment," Petkovic said. "So I just asked her what happened, and she told me that she felt very dizzy. Then I asked if it was the same,if it still was the concussion.
"She said, yeah,it tends to come back when she gets physically very active. I think she did say that, that's my words now."
Tsonga also took a medical time-out trailing 2-4 during the second set of his 7-6 (4), 6-2 loss to 64th-ranked Andreas Haider-Maurer. Tsonga said afterward he felt a rush of dizziness after running hard during a point.
“It came just like this, on one run. After one run, I went back to play a return and I feel a little bit dizzy," Tsonga said. "I had time to recover, then I was okay."
The eighth-seeded Tsonga blamed his erratic performance, rather than the illness, for his defeat.
"For me, it's not really important what happened to me when I was a little bit dizzy," Tsonga said. "The most important for me in this match was the start of the match and this first set I lost. The second set, I didn't play well. That's it. Today, I didn't lose because I was dizzy. I just lost because I was bad, and that's it."
Photo credit: Greg Baker/AFP