Graf to Play in Florida After 8-Week Recovery

Steffi Graf will return to tournament play Monday, eight weeks after chipping a bone in her thumb in a skiing accident, and she expects it to be all downhill from here.

“If I didn’t feel I could win the tournament, there is no way I would try to play,” Graf said from her home at Boca Raton, Fla.

“I’m curious about how I’ll play after the layoff, but I’m not nervous about it.”

The 20-year-old West German broke a bone in her right thumb on Feb. 7 when she fell while trying to elude a group of photographers at the Swiss resort of St. Moritz.

Her hand and wrist were placed in a cast for four weeks. She resumed practicing 2 1/2 weeks ago at Boca Raton for the $350,000 Bausch and Lomb Championships at Amelia Island, Fla.

Graf, ranked No. 1 in the world, heads the field, which includes No. 3 Gabriela Sabatini, No. 5 Arantxa Sanchez Vicario, No. 6 Zina Garrison and No. 9 Conchita Martinez.

Despite Graf’s two-month absence, her position atop the computer rankings was unchallenged. Second-ranked Martina Navratilova picked up only a half-point on Graf in eight weeks, mainly because the weight of Graf’s Grand Slam title in the Australian Open dominated the computer.

The first meeting of Navratilova and Graf this year could come later this month at Hamburg, West Germany, in the first tournament both have entered in the same event. However, Graf said she is not concerned about challenges to her ranking.

“I don’t think I have to prove anything,” she said. “Over the last couple of years, I’ve had such an amazing career and such amazing results. . . . I think I’m going to be OK.”

During her forced layoff, Graf said she was relieved to be away from tennis. She fulfilled several media requests in West Germany, then retreated to Florida.

“It’s good if your mind sometimes gets somewhere else,” Graf said. “When I had the layoff, tennis wasn’t really what I was looking at. I had a good time being away.”

Another side of Graf is featured in the April issue of Vogue. In the six-page layout, she is photographed in swimsuits and a low-cut black dress.