COPENHAGEN: Denmark’s double Olympic badminton champion Viktor Axelsen introduced his retirement at 32 on Wednesday (Apr 15), saying again issues meant he may not “compete and practice on the highest stage”.
Axelsen, who received gold on the Tokyo Video games in 2021 and once more in Paris in 2024, had again surgical procedure in April final yr and mentioned he had not managed to beat his bodily points.
“Accepting this example has been extremely tough,” he mentioned in a press release.
“However I’ve now reached some extent the place my physique will not enable me to proceed.”
Axelsen retires as probably the most adorned gamers in historical past, having additionally received two world titles and a bronze medal on the 2016 Rio Olympics.
He spent greater than 100 consecutive weeks on the prime of the lads’s singles world rankings, an achievement surpassed solely by Malaysian nice Lee Chong-wei.
Standing 194cm and making full use of his big wingspan, Axelsen redefined what a participant may do on the court docket.
He was additionally fashionable with followers world wide and spoke fluent Mandarin.
Axelsen mentioned he had “completed every thing I as soon as dreamed of, and extra”.
“What makes it hardest to say goodbye is just not the competitors itself, however every thing round it, the journey, the every day grind, the individuals,” he mentioned.
Axelsen received Olympic gold on the pandemic-delayed Tokyo Video games in 2021 with out dropping a single recreation all event.
He beat China’s Chen Lengthy within the remaining, turning into the primary non-Asian to say the title since 1996.
He sobbed in disbelief after Chen hit his remaining shot lengthy, then regained his composure to take a courtside telephone name from Denmark’s Crown Prince Frederik.
