Pune: Three years ago, Shruti Ahlawat couldn’t get out of bed without help. She couldn’t feel her right leg, let alone a tennis ball on her strings.Last fortnight (Sunday , May 3), at the DLTA Complex in Delhi, the 19-year-old held her first professional $15k ITF title aloft — a trophy that represented far more than a tournament win — a victory over a body that, for a long time, seemed to have given up on her.The Price of Ambition In September 2022, Shruti was a rising star in Indian tennis. After winning the Grade B1 Asian Closed junior title in Pune, she rocketed into the world top-50. But with elite success came a dangerous urge to push further.“A week after Pune, I had a hairline fracture in my shin,” Shruti recalled. “But I kept thinking, ‘I’m top-50 now, I need to get to top 20, top 10 … then I’ll take a break.'”Lacking a professional sports science team to guide her, the then 16-year-old made the “immature” decision to play through the pain, eventually breaking her other shin. Incredibly, she competed in the Australian Open junior main draw on two broken legs. It was a gamble that would cost her the next two years of her career.The Long, Arduous Rehab The true nightmare began in June 2023. During a training session, a sharp, electric pain shot through her back. It was a slip disc, impingement of the sciatica nerve so severe it threatened to end her career before it truly began.The transition from an elite athlete to a bedridden patient was brutal. “For a few months, I needed help to eat, to take a shower, to use the restroom,” she says. “I would say to my family, ‘I don’t think I can get back.'”Ironically, Shruti was born into a family of wrestlers from the “never-say-die” soil of Jhajjar. Her grandfather, Dayanand, had steered her toward tennis specifically to avoid the brutal injuries common in wrestling. Yet, here she was, facing a physical toll that would have broken a seasoned pro.Learning to Walk Again Her recovery was a lesson in extreme patience. It took nearly a year just to transition from bed rest to walking, and eventually to three-minute jogs. A premature comeback attempt in March 2025 at an event in Gurugram proved her body wasn’t ready. She was forced into another six-month hiatus as her muscles, weakened by months of immobility, began to fail in new ways.“My ankle, my shoulder, my knee—everything was sensitive because I had been on bed rest for so long,” she explained. Under the guidance of Florida-based trainer Justin Russ, she slowly rebuilt herself from the ground up.Shruti Ahlawat 2.0 Today, Shruti is a different player —and a different person. She speaks candidly about the lack of sports science awareness in Indian junior tennis, citing her own over-training and lack of structured conditioning as the root of her ordeal.“It taught me that at the end of the day, you’re the one who has to motivate yourself,” she says. “I have to be my own cheerleader, because times will get tough, but I have to be my number one support.”The results are already showing. After a semifinal run in Panipat, she tore through the Delhi draw without dropping a set until the final. Now, currently ranked 850, she has her sights set on a top-400 ranking by the end of 2026.The nightmare is officially over. Shruti Ahlawat is no longer just a junior prodigy. She is a survivor, finally ready to start the career she nearly lost.
