Pro tennis player Simona Halep's cups no longer runneth over.

While we're on a run of breast reduction posts, I'd like to highlight the related story of Romanian tennis player, Simona Halep. Ms. Halep is a 17 year old tennis prospect who was good enough to win the French Open junior division in 2008 and is working her way up the WTA rankings (currently at #274). Unfortunately for her, she was attracting as much attention for her breast size (reportedly 34DD) as she was for her tennis talent.

Well word got out in the spring that she was considering a breast reduction (reduction mammaplasty), it took things to a whole other level. Photo spreads in British tabloids, fan sites, "Stop Simona from reducing her breasts" Facebook groups (I'm not kidding, click here), and even the infamous Opie & Andy show on satellite radio got in on the act.






Here's a video clip of her practicing where you can see the problems large breasts would cause with movement. WOW, Does she really hit the ball hard or what!





Well it would appear Simona quietly went ahead with the surgery this summer and is recovering to return to her high level athletic career. Resuming the training and competing after this operation could be tricky. There's real reason to be extremely conservative in clearing her to train. At 2 weeks after surgery the breaking strength of her scar would be about 50%, and by six weeks it would be approaching 90% tensile strength. With the kind of torque, tension, and range of motion she will be putting on her incisions there is real reason to believe she may have issues with poor scarring from her reduction.

Discussing her decision in interviews, Ms. Halep

But Simona's set proved too much to handle during matches and she feared they were stopping her from winning titles.

Last month she admitted: "It's the weight that troubles me - my ability to react quickly, my breasts make me uncomfortable when I play as well.

"I don't like them in my everyday life either. I would have gone for surgery too, even if I hadn't been a sportswoman," she added.

The photo below is purportedly after her surgery in late June or early July.



A breast reduction the size of hers is likely not going to be possible with many of the modern "short scar" techniques that I prefer. I would bet she had a traditional "Wise Pattern" or anchor shaped incision.

Rob