NEW HAVEN, Conn. -- Venus Williams stopped her match with
Sandrine Testud for a three-minute medical timeout, then served two
aces on the way to a 7-6 (5), 6-3 victory Tuesday in the Pilot Pen
Tennis Tournament.
Williams said her back started to hurt during the match and was
getting worse, so she decided to get some treatment while she was
up a game in the second set.
Her back has not bothered her before, and Williams said she did
not consider ending the match over the injury.
"I have a good trainer so I'm hoping to get a lot of work on it
tonight," she said.
Testud noted that Williams served two aces over 110 mph after
she came back from the medical timeout.
"I wish I had the same problem," Testud said.
Williams responded that a serve does not take too much movement.
"It's one of the strongest points of my game," she said.
Williams, the No. 3 seed and two-time defending champion,
struggled at the start of the second-round match and nearly dropped
the first set before rallying to win in a tiebreaker. She has never
dropped a set at the Pilot Pen.
In another second-round match, Amelie Mauresmo took Henrieta
Nagyova to the longest tiebreaker on the tour this year in a 7-6
(14), 6-3 victory.
"The tension was so high in the tiebreaker," Mauresmo said.
"Mentally, it was very good to win. Obviously at the beginning of
the second set she was a little bit down."
Mauresmo will play Lindsay Davenport in a third-round match
Wednesday.
Davenport, the tournament's top seed, advanced with a quick 6-2,
6-1 win over qualifier Anastasia Myskina on Tuesday night.
Davenport broke Myskina in her final three service games and closed
out the 50-minute match with a deft backhand drop shot at the net.
"Nothing to complain about tonight," said Davenport, who took
last week off after winning the estyle.com Classic in Los Angeles.
"I was trying to dictate the points out there and really trying to
be aggressive. I felt like I was pretty much in control the whole
match."
Fourth-seeded Kim Clijsters, a finalist at the French Open, beat
Aranxta Sanchez Vicario 6-1, 6-4, rallying from a 1-4 deficit in
the second set.
"I wasn't playing as aggressive. I think I was hitting too many
balls to her backhand. She's got a very good backhand," Clijsters
said.
The 18-year-old Clijsters earned her seventh career singles
title with a win over Davenport last month at Stanford. It was her
first victory over Davenport in five meetings and she reached a
career-best No. 5 ranking.
In first-round matches, fifth-seeded Justine Henin beat Asa
Carlsson 6-2, 6-3; No. 7 Nathalie Tauziat defeated Meghann
Shaughnessy 6-2, 2-6 7-5; qualifier Kveta Hrdlickova beat Daja
Bedanova 1-6, 6-3, 6-2; and Anke Huber downed Magui Serna 6-2, 6-2.
Henin arrived in New Haven last year ranked No. 66 in the world
and recovering from injuries. Now healthy, she is enjoying a career
year that included an appearance in the Wimbledon finals where she
lost to Williams.
Ranked No. 6, the 19-year-old Belgian attributes her rise to
hard work, both physically and mentally.
"I'm still learning. I think it's a good experience to be in
the top 10 at 19 years old," she said. "Everything came very
fast, but I think I'm prepared now in my head for the U.S. Open.
"(Wimbledon) was a good experience. I beat good players, but
when I played against Venus I said `OK I still have a lot of work
to really be in the top.' I'm still learning now. I'm still very
young," she said.
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