Petra Kvitova kicks off milestone 400th career week in Top 10 of WTA rankings

A month ago, Petra Kvitova won her biggest title in almost five years, lifting the trophy at the WTA 1000 event in Miami. Two days later on April 3rd she returned to the Top 10, rising to No. 10.

She hasn’t budged from the No. 10 spot since then—and today, on May 1st, she kicks off her milestone 400th career week in the Top 10.

Kvitova is just the second active women’s player to reach that number after Venus Williams, who spent 636 career weeks in the Top 10 between 1998 and 2018. Simona Halep is close with 394.

KVITOVA’S CAREER WEEKS IN THE TOP 10 (400 & COUNTING):

• 122 weeks from May 9th, 2011 to September 8th, 2013
• 137 weeks from September 30th, 2013 to May 15th, 2016
• 2 weeks from June 27th to July 10th, 2016
• 102 weeks from February 19th, 2018 to February 2nd, 2020
• 25 weeks from October 12th, 2020 to April 4th, 2021
• 2 weeks from April 12th to 25th, 2021
• 1 week from May 10th to 16th, 2021
• 2 weeks from June 28th to July 11th, 2021
• 2 weeks from September 13th to 26th, 2021
• 5 weeks (and counting) since April 3rd, 2023

Kvitova has spent 27 of those 400 weeks at her career-high of No. 2, and they’ve been spread out across four different years: she spent her first 15 weeks there between October 2011 and February 2012; then five more weeks in 2015; then seven more weeks in 2019.

After winning the ninth WTA 1000 title of her career in Miami this year, Kvitova was asked what has kept her going strong after all these years through all the ups and downs in her career.

“Well, even after ups it’s tough to get back to work, I would say. The downs make you feel really sad, and you just want to, like, kick it and just do better. So that’s why probably you just go to the court, and trying to be a better player every time you’re on the court.

“Yeah, I love the game, as you mentioned, but I think it’s the motivation to do something better, and because I had a lot of ups as well, that’s always been the motivation to have them again.

“I think this is the best feeling what you can have, winning a final as I did today. That’s what I love the most, the winning feeling of it.”

Kvitova has done a lot of winning, and the bigger the match, the more dangerous she is—not only does she have 30 career WTA titles, but she’s a remarkable 30-11 in finals. Her biggest titles are her two Grand Slam titles, both at Wimbledon in 2011 and 2014, as well as her victory at the season-ending WTA Finals in 2011.