Paris Olympics 2024: Returning to the ‘terre battue’ at Roland Garros

Paris Olympics tennis shifts to red clay, challenging players to adapt quickly between surfaces for upcoming tournaments.

The competition surface doesn't change for most Olympic sports. A pool's a pool. A track's a track. A wrestling mat's a mat. And so on. Tennis? That's a whole other story, with tournaments contested on clay, hard or grass courts — and now there's a shift for the Paris Games.

For the first time in more than 30 years, the tennis competition at an Olympics will be held on red clay, which means players who recently made the adjustment from the dirt at the French Open in early June to grass at Wimbledon in early July will need to reverse course again in short order.

The “terre battue” at Roland Garros used for the French Open hosts Olympic matches starting on July 27 — two weeks after Wimbledon wrapped up with singles titles for Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic and Carlos Alcaraz of Spain — and the transition back to that site is more concerning to some athletes than others.

“That'll definitely be interesting. But everyone's kind of doing it. We'll all be in the same boat,” said Jessica Pegula, an American ranked in the top 10 who is expected to play singles, women's doubles with U.S. Open champion Coco Gauff and perhaps mixed doubles, too. “I usually don't struggle too much with switching. And I like how the courts play there. It might be easier than some other places we play on clay. When the weather is warm in Paris, it plays pretty true. There's a good speed. There's not a lot to get used to.” For her, maybe.

“It's going to be the first time for me, going from grass to clay," said Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan, the 2022 Wimbledon champion and a semifinalist there this month. "It's not easy. Physically, it's not easy, (or) mentally.” One additional factor on some players' minds: There will be another brief turnaround after the Olympics to prepare for the move to the hard courts ahead of the U.S. Open, which starts in late August. That's less than a month after the medals are awarded in France.

“It's awful for the schedule,” said Taylor Fritz, Pegula's teammate for the United States and someone who just reached the quarterfinals at the All England Club. “It makes absolutely no sense. It screws everything up, for sure.” Tennis becomes a different sport, in some key ways, depending on where it's being played.

“You have to adapt to it. ... It's going to be weird, obviously, going back on the clay quickly,” said Cam Norrie, who will represent Britain at the Olympics, “but we're changing surface and changing variables all the time.” Clay is softer and slower, which can dull the power on serves and groundstrokes and create longer exchanges, putting a premium on stamina, while the grittiness can magnify the effect of heavy topspin. Grass is speedier and balls bounce lower. Hard courts tend to produce truer, midrange bounces and generally will reward those who go for point-ending shots.