Venus Williams rolls in third round of U.S. Open

NEW YORK – The sterling summer of 28-year-old Venus Williams looked luminous as ever at the U.S. Open today.

While other top players such as Ana Ivanovic and Jelena Jankovic have held gooey three-set tugs-of-war with lower-ranked players, the reigning Wimbledon champion Williams continued a pattern of serene mastery when she blazed through No. 113 ranked Rossana De Los Rios, 6-0, 6-3.

That pushed Williams to the third round of a tournament in which she has never lost before the fourth round, has reached the quarterfinals eight times out of nine, has reached the final four times, and has won twice.

“Obviously winning Wimbledon makes you confident, so I don’t have any complaints,” she said.

After commanding the match with 72nd-ranked Samantha Stosur in the first round, Williams required only 59 minutes today to defeat De Los Rios, a 32-year-old Paraguyan whom Williams had never played. The 2000 and 2001 champion has lost eight games in two matches.

“I think I just had a lot more power than she did today,” Williams said.

Her memory bank also has more power that of her sister and fellow Olympic doubles gold medalist Serena Williams, who will play Elena Vesnina of Russia in the first match of the evening session. Whereas Serena Williams said she no longer remembered the latter of her two U.S. Open titles because it has been a long time since 2002, Venus Williams said, “Oh, yes, I remember. I won’t forget, but I’d like to have a more recent memory as of, like, ‘08.”

For her most recent U.S. Open title, in 2001, Venus defeated her sister in a tepid 6-2, 6-4 match that became the first of their five Grand Slam-event-final tussles in six grand slams. From here, she encounters the No. 31 player in the world, Alona Bondarenko of Ukraine, whose younger sister Kateryna lost in the first round to Serena Williams.