PETE ZIEBRON
Caroline Wozniacki, winner of 3 WTA tournaments in August 2010. Pete Ziebron Images
Number 1 seed Caroline Wozniacki won 3 tournaments in the month of August and has continued her fierce play dropping only 3 games through the first 3 rounds of the 2010 US Open. Three games lost in 6 sets of tennis! Next up in the 4th round, 2006 US Open Champion Maria Sharapova.
Sharapova will present a new set of challenges to Wozniacki when they meet in the 4th round tomorrow. However, consider the knuckleballs that Wozniacki has fended off in the last 3 weeks. Despite being the top seed, Wozniacki's first match was scheduled for Tuesday night, after the men's match. Wozniacki did not begin the match until 11:50 PM due to the fact that all of the day session matches went the distance, significantly delaying the start of the night session.
Wozniacki came into the US Open on a torrid pace, winning 3 of her last 4 tournaments. After being crowned Champion at the inaugural tournament in her home country of Denmark, Wozniacki immediately flew to Cincinnati and lost in her 2nd match. However, she refused to blame the ambitious travel schedule for the loss: "It has (travel), of course, an effect, because you need to get your body ready. But it's also very mental as well. You just need to say to yourself, Okay, you have the match. Just prepare for that. It's the most important thing."
Following the loss in Cincinnati, Wozniacki arrived in Montreal and won the first of 2 titles in a 6 day span. Due to excessive rain in Montreal, the Final was not played until Monday and Wozniacki defeated Vera Zvonareva to win the title. Next, Wozniacki cruised through the field in New Haven, CT and beat Nadia Petrova on Saturday, 5 days following her win in Montreal and only 2 days before the start of the US Open. "It's great. I've had two victories in two weeks and three victories in four weeks. I feel I'm in a great shape, playing well. Hopefully I can just continue the next couple of weeks at the US Open."
So far so good in New York as Wozniacki won her first 3 matches at the US Open by the scores of 6-1 6-1, 6-0 6-0 and 6-1 6-0 in an average of only 57 minutes per match. After her 2nd win in New York, Wozniacki shared "I'm feeling great. I'm feeling good. I feel fresh. I feel like it's a new tournament. I'm all recovered from everything, and I'm just happy to be playing and to be injury free and everything is perfect........the atmosphere here is great. I really love playing here. I mean, it's a great feeling. Also coming back from last year, you know, being in the finals, coming back here and just, yeah, playing on the big courts, it's a great feeling."
Caroline Wozniacki hopes to take the next step in a repeat run to the US Open Finals in her 4th round match against Maria Sharapova tomorrow at Arthur Ashe Stadium.
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