Sampras Turns Red Clay Into a Hard Court

For Pete Sampras, the draw fraught with peril lurking around every corner did not surface on Monday, leaving his pursuit of the elusive French Open title intact.

It wasn’t supposed to be this smooth, this simple, in the first round at Roland Garros. Not against Todd Martin, who established his clay-court credentials by winning at Barcelona in April, the first time an American has won a European clay-court event since 1994.

But the top-ranked Sampras settled in and set up shop on Court Central and easily dispatched Martin, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3, in 1 hour 56 minutes on a cool, breezy opening day of the French Open.

Before you start thinking of Sampras as Mr. Clay, the two serve-and-volley artists didn’t exactly stage a grueling baseline duel.

“Playing Todd today is like playing a hard-court match,” Sampras said.

And it showed. Sampras was efficient--losing his serve just twice--and had a more confident bounce in his step. He drew Martin in and hit some solid passing shots and returned serve well.

Oddly enough, instead of Sampras, it was the favorite, No. 3-ranked Marcelo Rios of Chile, who found himself with more of a fight than expected. Rios, who won two clay-court tournaments the last two weeks, needed four sets to subdue the lightly regarded Brett Steven of New Zealand, winning, 7-5, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3, in 2 hours 30 minutes.

Rios was a one-man drama, tumbling to the clay several times and needing treatment twice, once for a scraped knee, the other for a sore left arm.

He grimaced.

He growled.

For good measure, he tossed his racket a couple of times.

And he played the tennis ball off his foot, soccer style, kicking it in the air twice.

His most interesting move came on the changeover when he was up 3-2 in the fourth set. Rios gave himself something of a chiropractic adjustment--for the queasy at home, the hope is that television network Eurosport was in a commercial during the changeover.

Taking his head in his hands, Rios gave his neck a quick snap. Hey, who needs doctors with the self-healing Rios on the premises?

He isn’t able to work miracles with his left arm quite yet. A sore left elbow forced him off the circuit shortly after his ascent to No. 1 in March.

“I’ve been having an injury for a couple of months,” he said. “Now it’s much better. But every time I play long matches, it’s getting really sore.”

The ailment hasn’t prevented many observers, including John McEnroe, from picking Rios to win the French Open.

“Magazines say I’m 48% to win this tournament,” Rios said.

As for Sampras’ chances, Martin doesn’t think they’re “that good” to win the French Open, despite his assured performance Monday.

“He has a chance, but I don’t think [it’s] great,” Martin said. “There [are] a lot of guys, who, on this surface, can give him a definite run for his money. I haven’t seen the draw at all, but I’m sure he’ll stumble upon those.

“I’m not saying he can’t beat them. But to beat a few of them in a row, it’s going to be difficult.”

It was mentioned that a classic serve-and-volley player, Patrick Rafter, reached the semifinals here in 1997.

Martin dismissed that.

“When you talk about Pete, that’s what you talk about, winning tournaments,” he said. “You don’t talk about him having a good tournament, making it to the quarterfinals. That’s not a good tournament for him.

“Pete’s a shotmaker. I’m not necessarily sure if [these are] shotmakers’ conditions. It’s gritty, consistent, steady, patient, those things. That’s why I’m sitting here talking about somebody else.”

Sampras is trying not to abandon his natural attacking instincts, pointing out that there is a fine line between patience and aggression.

The one concession he has made to playing on clay is standing out wide on the ad court, and hitting kick serves.

“I’ve never tried it on anything but clay,” Sampras said. “You can get it out wide. The guy is way off the court and you can usually get a forehand on the next shot. Occasionally you’re going to get burned. It kind of puts my opponent in a tough position right off the bat. Andre [Agassi] and Michael [Chang] do it.”

Three of the top male players exited quickly--No. 5-seeded Greg Rusedski of England, who doesn’t hide his disdain for clay, was gone before lunch, losing, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4, to Johan Van Herck of Belgium.

Austria’s Thomas Muster, the French Open champion in 1995, beat No. 7 Jonas Bjorkman of Sweden, 6-3, 6-3, 6-3, and Todd Woodbridge of Australia defeated No. 9 Karol Kucera of Slovakia, 1-6, 6-2, 6-4, 6-3.

Rafter’s match against Sebastien Lareau of Canada was suspended because of darkness before the start of the fifth set.

The biggest surprise among the three top female players to lose was No. 9 Irina Spirlea, a 1997 U.S. Open semifinalist who was upset by Sylvia Plischke of Austria, 6-2, 6-4. Plischke, ranked 88th, had won only one match since mid-February. Also departing were No. 12 Nathalie Tauziat of France, a 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 loser to Emmanuelle Gagliardi of Switzerland, and No. 16 Lisa Raymond, a 6-3, 6-4 loser to Tatiana Panova of Russia.

Tauziat had eliminated Venus Williams in the second round of the French last year, but it won’t happen this year.

Eighth-seeded Williams was one of the top female players to advance Monday, including No. 1 Martina Hingis, No. 3 Jana Novotna, No. 10 Iva Majoli and No. 13 Anna Kournikova.

Williams’ service winners were clocked up to 108 mph as she won 12 of the last 14 games to defeat Tamarine Tanasugarn of Thailand, 6-3, 6-1.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Today’s Featured Matches

MEN

* Gustavo Kuerten, Brazil (8) vs. Charles Auffray, France

* Andre Agassi vs. Marat Safin, Russia

* Michael Chang (11) vs. Alex Calatrava, Spain

WOMEN

* Monica Seles (6) vs. Annabel Ellwood, Austria

* Lindsay Davenport (2) vs. Kimberly Po.

* Serena Williams vs. Jana Nejedly, Canada.

* Amanda Coetzer, South Africa (5) vs. Patty Schnyder, Switzerland

* Conchita Martinez, Spain (7) vs. Magalie Lamarre, France

ON TV

USA, 10 a.m.

(reshown at 1 p.m.)