Former doubles No. 1 Storm Hunter is set to return to competition at the ATX Open in Austin, Texas later this month. Hunter, 30, was sidelined for 10 months after rupturing her Achilles tendon during practice at the Billie Jean King Cup last April. 

Hunter announced her return on the Australian Open's podcast, "The Tennis."

"I'm very excited to announce that I'm back," Hunter said. "I'm ready to compete. We're leaving next week to head to Austin, Texas for a WTA 250 and then Indian Wells and Miami. So I'm going to be playing doubles at those three events."

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Hunter will begin her comeback alongside her good friend Caroline Dolehide. In 2023, Hunter became the third Australian woman to ascend to WTA Doubles No. 1 and finished that season as the PIF WTA Rankings year-end No.1. At the time of her injury, Hunter had just begun to gain traction in singles. Weeks before her injury, she hit a career-high singles ranking at No.114. 

"I'm not quite ready for singles yet, but I'm ready for doubles," Hunter said. "I'm excited to get back on the road and get back to being a professional tennis player and close this chapter of being an injured athlete.

"It feels like it's come really fast, but I've been working really hard and I'm really excited." 

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Hunter is an eight-time champion on the Hologic WTA Tour doubles circuit, with four of those titles coming at the WTA 1000 level. Her breakthrough came with Luisa Stefani at 2022 Guadalajara. The following year, she won two WTA 1000s with Elise Mertens in Rome and Guadalajara, and opened the 2024 season by winning Dubai with Katerina Siniakova. She is a Grand Slam champion in mixed doubles at the 2022 US Open and finished runner-up with Mertens at Wimbledon in 2023.

"It's been a crazy journey," Hunter said. "From learning to re-walk again, to jumping -- the first time I started running and getting back on the court again and wondering if I could do this."

"At times it felt like a really big mountain to get back so now, I'm not quite back at the top of the mountain, but it definitely feels a lot closer."