Serena Williams reveals secret to controversial extreme weight loss

The 23-time tennis Grand Slam winner opens up about her dramatic body transformation in a candid interview.

Former tennis star Serena Williams arrives on the red carpet before hosting the 2024 ESPYS at Dolby Theatre. | Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

Serena Williams shocked recently when she posted a picture of herself in the gym looking like a completely different person from the one we saw win 23 Grand Slams on the tennis court.

Before that, the 43-year-old Williams was seen during the Super Bowl halftime show for Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” song performance that generated a lot of buzz, especially because Williams dated Drake and the song is a diss of him even though she denied it had anything to do with that.

Serena Williams backstage at the Super Bowl getting ready. | Serena Williams / Instagram

Over 6 months later, Williams reappeared in photos like these with her daughter and this selfie where she transformed into a different body since February.

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Now, in an interview with Vogue Magazine, Williams opened up about her weight loss of over 30 pounds: “I’ve heard negative comments, along with a tremendous amount of positive comments, about my body my entire life,” she said. “For lack of a better way to say it, I don’t really care what people are saying about my body anymore. But what is important to me is transparency.”

That’s when she revealed she’s on a GLP-1 drug called Zepbound to help with her weight.

GLP-1 drugs are typically injected to treat diabetes, but can be used for obesity as well.

Williams opined up about struggling with her weight even as a star athlete:

“There’s a scene in my HBO documentary where you see my coach telling me, ‘You have to lose weight,’” she said. “But it was so hard after I had [my first daughter] Olympia. I was literally on the court every day, doing nothing else. I had been the ultimate super-athlete, always in competition and being super-healthy my entire life, but I just could never get back to where I needed to be, no matter what I did.”

Now, with the weight loss on the drug she said she’s now “feeling like my old self.” She’s looking anything but.

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