By Lialah Mavani
For over a decade, Nouran Gohar’s career has been defined by what comes next: the next tournament, the next title, the next opponent standing between her and the top of the rankings.
Already, at just 28 years old, she has an impressive squash resume; reaching world No.1 for the first time in 2020, winning three British Open titles, four US Open titles and a World Championship title. Gohar has established herself as one of the best players of her generation.
In November 2025, the unexpected happened. Gohar announced that she was stepping away from the professional tour to start a family.
Now, less than a year later, the Terminator is back.
She left it all on court during her last event of the 2025-26 season, the CIB Egyptian Open. She stormed through the draw to reach the semi-finals of the Diamond event without dropping a game. She eventually bowed out in a 3–0 loss to the current world No.1 Hania El Hammamy.
What fans didn’t see was what Gohar’s body was going through behind the scenes: the vomiting, the nausea, and other symptoms of early pregnancy.
Gohar competed in the event, finishing in the top four, not knowing she was already two months pregnant. Two months later, she announced her break from the tour.
“I never pictured myself coming back [to squash] after pregnancy, never in my life,” Gohar says.
The break may not have been the timing Gohar originally imagined, but it became an opportunity to step away from a sport that had consumed much of her adult life. After 15 years of travelling the world and competing professionally, she found herself able to experience squash from the outside. For the first time in years, she could watch matches without worrying about her own next result.
“I was enjoying it as a fan, watching and seeing what's happening and analysing from a point where I wasn't stressed about squash. I mean, I don't love training, but I love getting results and all of that,” she said.
That distance helped Gohar recognise that the break was something she needed.
Her 2024-25 season emphasised her dominance on tour; she won eight titles of 13 finals contested, losing before the final only once all season. But even with the titles and competing amongst the sport’s best, she was still left asking: “So what now?”
“I felt like I needed something to fire [me up] and then be more motivated to keep on going,” she said. “So I think it was the best timing for me to just leave the sport on a good note and just take a gap.”
Her previous experience with injury had given her an idea of what stepping away could do. In 2023, a plantar fascia tear forced her to spend six months away from professional squash.
“Funny enough, coming back after that period was the best,” Gohar said. “The few months after that period were my best results technically on tour.”
But pregnancy presented a fundamentally different challenge.
“Coming back from pregnancy, it’s a completely different story because your whole body changes; it’s not the same anymore,” she said.
For women athletes, returning to elite competition after having a child remains relatively uncommon, particularly in squash. Nour El Tayeb (HWR #3) and Nathalie Grinham (HWR #2) are among the few former top-five ranked PSA players to have returned to the tour after becoming mothers.
For Gohar, El Tayeb’s experience was proof that returning to squash was possible. Nour returned back to the tour after just 14 months, following the birth of her daughter, Farida.
She eventually climbed her way back into the top five, just seven months into being back on tour, an impressive result for any player, postpartum or not.
Seeing another player, a friend, navigate that transition helped Gohar challenge an assumption she had held herself: that starting a family and continuing a professional squash career were mutually exclusive.
“There are so many more tennis players that have done this than in squash, and I don't see why we can’t,” Gohar said. “I know it's not easy, it's far from easy, but again, it’s not impossible.
“I feel like we always have this stereotype that it's just impossible... I hope at some point I can prove to people that this is not something that is impossible.”
The difficulty of postpartum extends well beyond returning to the court.
Pregnancy and childbirth can fundamentally change an athlete’s body. Training has to be adjusted and implemented gradually, while recovery, sleep and energy can look very different with a newborn at home. There is also the mental adjustment of becoming a mother while simultaneously trying to return to a career built around performance.
For Gohar, that meant learning to be patient with a body that responded differently to before.
Similar to when she was studying engineering while competing professionally, Gohar has faced plenty of people who questioned whether she could do it all. But doubt has never been something the Terminator has accepted.
“I always love to prove to people that nothing is impossible,” she said.
“Yes, it's hard. That's one thing, and that's why not everyone can do it. But if you put in the work and you truly believe in it, and this is something you want to do, I feel there is no reason to just put it as a barrier. I just hate that.”
Gohar reached world No. 1 for the first time in the same year she graduated from university. Her fierce mentality and work ethic have always been central to her success. Now, she is applying that same mentality to a new challenge.
After pregnancy and childbirth, returning to the intensity and training demands required of a professional squash player takes time. Even when the desire to train is there, the body has its own timeline.
“It's tricky,” Gohar said. “I tried as much as I could because at the end of the day I’m human, not to compare myself to my old self and say, oh, this session used to be super easy for me.”
Instead, Gohar has tried to measure her progress day-by-day.
“Since the day I gave birth, every single day for me is that I want to get better than yesterday,” she said.
“But sometimes [I wonder], am I gonna get better? Where do I stand in terms of level? Because again, when you're away for a year, you don't really know.”
That uncertainty is perhaps one of the hardest parts of returning to elite sport. Before her pregnancy, Gohar knew exactly what her body could do and where she stood in the rankings.
Now, she is relearning its capabilities. And she is doing so while adjusting to life as a new mother.
The goal, now, is not necessarily to recreate the player who stepped away from the tour. It is to build a new version of her.
“This [returning to the tour] is a win in itself,” she said. “If I feel okay, I'm progressing. I'm on the right track. It's just a matter of time, and that's how I'm approaching it.”
The Terminator may be returning to the court, but this comeback is different from anything that came before it. The rankings, titles and familiar rivals will still be there. So will a new generation of players, led by Amina Orfi, who have continued to shape the women’s game while Gohar was away.
But Gohar is no longer simply chasing the next title; she is discovering what is possible.
