Blog · Players · 14 Jul 2026 · 7 min read
Alexander Zverev: The Champion Who Checks His Blood Sugar at Changeovers
Somewhere in the middle of this year's Wimbledon final — between tiebreaks, in front of fifteen thousand people — **Alexander Zverev** did the thing he has done at changeovers his whole career and hidden for most of it: checked his blood sugar. The runner-up story of this Wimbledon is one of the most quietly remarkable in the sport: a lifelong type 1 diabetic playing five-set tennis at the highest level ever seen.
The Diagnosis Doctors Thought Ended It
Zverev was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes as a small child, and the early medical advice to his family was blunt: professional sport, with its violent physical swings, was not a realistic life. His body doesn't produce insulin; a five-set match is a five-hour balancing act of glucose, adrenaline and exertion that most of us never have to think about once.
He kept the condition private for nearly two decades of his career, managing injections and monitoring in locker rooms, before going public in 2022 and starting a foundation to support children with the same diagnosis. The message he says he wished he'd heard as a kid: it doesn't have to stop you.
Tennis Royalty, Hamburg Edition
Zverev was practically born on a tennis court: his parents were Soviet players who emigrated to Hamburg, his father was his coach from the start, and his older brother Mischa reached the ATP top 25. Sascha was the family project and the German prodigy — junior world No. 1, ATP Finals champion at 21, and owner of one of the biggest, most reliable second serves the game has ever seen.
The résumé built steadily: Olympic singles gold in Tokyo, two ATP Finals titles, a horror ankle injury in the 2022 Roland-Garros semifinal against Nadal that cost him half a career-best season — and then, this June, the breakthrough that reframed everything: the Roland-Garros 2026 title, his first major, at 29.
Wimbledon 2026: The Streak and the Wall Named Sinner
He arrived at Wimbledon on a thirteen-match Grand Slam winning streak and cut through the draw without dropping serve in the semifinal, sweeping the first-set tiebreak against Arthur Fery seven points to zero to become the first German man in a Wimbledon final since Boris Becker in 1995.
The final showed both the ceiling and the wall. For two sets, Sinner couldn't break him — nobody had all fortnight. But Zverev has now lost ten straight matches to the world No. 1, and when the first break finally came in the third set, the pattern held: 6-7, 7-6, 6-3, 6-4. The consolation is real, though — on grass, previously his worst major, he found a final. The German wait for a men's champion continues; it just got a lot shorter-looking.
FAQs
- Does Alexander Zverev really have diabetes?
- Yes — type 1 diabetes, diagnosed in early childhood. He manages it throughout matches, went public with the condition in 2022, and runs a foundation supporting children with diabetes.
- Has Zverev won a Grand Slam?
- Yes. He won Roland-Garros in June 2026, his first major title, and a month later reached the Wimbledon 2026 final — the first German man to do so since Boris Becker in 1995 — losing to Jannik Sinner.
- What is Zverev's record against Sinner?
- Heavily one-sided: the Wimbledon 2026 final was Sinner's tenth consecutive win over Zverev.
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