Female Wimbledon Players Will Be Allowed Heat Breaks But Men Won’t

We’re currently set for one of the hottest Wimbledon’s in years, with the chances of rain delays evaporating by the second, and it’s only getting warmer.

Temperatures are set to reach 33C on Wednesday, which to put in context is four degrees hotter than Ibiza at the time of writing. To say it’s sweltering is an understatement.

As such, female players at the tournament will be allowed 10 minute heat breaks to cool down between the second and third set once the temperature hits 30.1C or higher.

Which make quite a lot of sense from a health perspective – at last year’s Australian open, which hit similar levels of heat, there were instances of players vomiting and one ball boy collapsed.

What doesn’t make sense, however, is the rule will only be applied to female players, while their men equivalents will be forced to simply soldier on.

Andy Murray spoke out about the ruling during the Australian tournament saying: “I don’t know why there are different rules - ff there’s a medical reason for it, then I’m fine with it. If there isn’t, I’m not."

At present this will be the first time that the rule has ever been enforced at the UK tournament and it’s likely to ruffle a lot of feathers when it comes into action tomorrow.

As it stands, the All England Club is under no obligation to create a similar rule for the men’s games, with a spokesman telling The Guardian that it was in the hands of the separate governing bodies for men’s and women’s tennis.

[Via: Daily Mail]

[Image: Getty]