Serena Williams will play mixed doubles with Carlos Alcaraz in her return to the US Open

NEW YORK (AP) — Serena Williams will team up with Carlos Alcaraz to create a powerhouse mixed doubles pair in her return to the U.S. Open.

The U.S. Tennis Association announced Saturday that Williams and Alcaraz had been given a wild card into the tournament. The mixed doubles main draw begins Tuesday, with the winning team sharing $1 million.

It will be Williams' first time playing at the U.S. Open since 2022. The 23-time Grand Slam singles champion returned to tennis this summer.

“Let’s gooooo!” Alcaraz posted on X, with a fire emoji and tagging Williams.

Williams is not planning to play singles in New York. The USTA had been holding one women's wild card, presumably in case Williams wanted it. However, the tournament announced Saturday that it had been given to American Sofia Kenin, the 2020 Australian Open champion.

Williams played singles at Wimbledon but sustained a knee injury in her first-round loss. She played doubles with older sister Venus at the Cincinnati Open, and they could still opt to play together at the U.S. Open.

Alcaraz announced this week he would return to defend his U.S. Open singles title after being sidelined since April with a right wrist injury.

Serena Williams won a mixed doubles title at the U.S. Open even before winning any of her six singles titles there. She teamed for the 1998 championship with Max Mirnyi, who now works with top-ranked woman Aryna Sabalenka.

The mixed doubles tournament is far different now, as the USTA revamped it last year to make it a two-day, 16-team event it hoped would draw top singles players.

Few are bigger than Williams and Alcaraz, the two-time U.S. Open men's champion who is ranked No. 2.

The USTA also announced a number of updates to the field after some players withdrew from the competition.

Americans Jessica Pegula and Taylor Fritz will team up, after their previous partners, Jack Draper and Elena Rybakina, pulled out with injuries. The teams of Emma Navarro and Tommy Paul, along with Karolina Muchova and Jakub Mensik, were given the remaining two wild cards into the main draw.

Also, Diana Shnaider remains in the field and will be given a chance to find a new partner after Daniil Medvedev withdrew.

The current field:

Sabalenka and Novak Djokovic, Pegula and Fritz, Iga Swiatek and Casper Ruud, Belinda Bencic and Flavio Cobolli, Amanda Anisimova and Learner Tien, two-time defending champions Sara Errani and Andrea Vavassori, Alex Eala and Felix Auger-Aliassime, Leylah Fernandez and Frances Tiafoe, Taylor Townsend and Alexander Zverev, Elina Svitolina and Gael Monfils, Williams and Alcaraz, Muchova and Mensik, and Navarro and Paul.

The remaining two spots will be determined through an eight-team qualifying tournament Monday. The USTA gave wild cards to the teams of Mirra Andreeva and Andrey Rublev, and Peyton Stearns and Christian Harrison, to be part of that field. It is otherwise largely made up of the traditional doubles specialists who lost out on the chance to play in the U.S. Open last year, with direct entry based on the players' combined singles ranking.

See AP’s full tennis coverage here

Serena Williams, of the United States, reacts to a winning point during a women's doubles match against Marta Kostyuk, of Ukraine, and Peyton Stearns, of the United States, at the Cincinnati Open tennis tournament, Monday, Aug. 17, 2026, in Mason, Ohio. (AP Photo/Kareem Elgazzar)

ZANDVOORT, Netherlands (AP) — Lando Norris beat his rivals and the weather to take pole position for the Dutch Grand Prix on Saturday after George Russell took a sprint race win on Formula 1’s return from its mid-season break.

As rain started to fall on the Zandvoort track, McLaren’s Norris made the most of his final run to reclaim pole by 0.102 of a second from Russell, whose Mercedes teammate Kimi Antonelli was third.

Lewis Hamilton lost ground to Antonelli in the standings in the sprint race. His difficult day continued with fifth in qualifying.

The sprint race was a display of domination from Russell, who started from pole position, quickly built a gap to Norris in second and managed the pace from there, taking his first win since the Austrian Grand Prix in June.

“Obviously a great start to the weekend,” he said.

Charles Leclerc snatched second off Norris with a daring pass into the inside of the first corner with six laps to go, but couldn’t get close enough to try passing Russell.

Norris held off a late charge from Antonelli to stay third as the Italian standings leader pulled out of a potential overtaking move on the final lap.

“We just don’t have the pace in general, especially in the slow-speed corners,” Norris said.

Fourth-place Antonelli, starting fifth after car damage in qualifying, still managed to extend his standings lead by three more points to 53 because Hamilton could only manage seventh for Ferrari.

F1 still hasn’t had a wet race this year but came tantalizingly close as rain fell as the drivers were heading back to the pits, seconds after the sprint finished.

“If there was one more lap it would have been a very, potentially, different end to the race so I’m glad the rain came when it did,” Russell said.

While it stayed dry, overtaking was difficult, even in a year where the cars’ electrical power has made back-and-forth passes common. The overtakes by Leclerc and Antonelli were the only changes of position anywhere in the top 11 finishers.

See AP’s full auto racing coverage here

Mercedes driver George Russell of Britain in action during sprint race at the Formula One Dutch Grand Prix in Zandvoort , Netherlands, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

Mercedes driver George Russell of Britain leads at the start during sprint race at the Formula One Dutch Grand Prix in Zandvoort , Netherlands, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)

Mercedes driver George Russell of Britain in action during sprint race at the Formula One Dutch Grand Prix in Zandvoort , Netherlands, Saturday, Aug. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Darko Bandic)