No.2 seed Iga Swiatek celebrated the one-year anniversary of her Roland Garros triumph in style Sunday, losing just one game in a 6-1, 6-0 win over 25th seed Veronika Kudermetova in the third round of the BNP Paribas Open. Swiatek will next face 2017 French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko.
The 2020 French Open champion is into the Round of 16 of Indian Wells in her tournament debut and has lost just five games; she beat Petra Martic 6-1, 6-3 in her opening round. Ranked a career-high No.4 coming into the tournament, Swiatek has now made the Round of 16 or better at all but two tournaments this season.
After the win, Swiatek told reporters she would be donating $50,000 of her prize money to a mental health non-profit in honor of World Mental Health Day.
"I would say in sports, for me it was always important to use that kind of help because I always thought that in my mental toughness there is some strength that I can use on court and I can also develop in that manner," Swiatek said.
The 20-year-old has traveled with sports psychologist Daria Abramowicz for the past three seasons.
"But I also know everybody has different paths, and it's great that we can choose our path because I know that there are people who also don't need psychologists. Basically, I'm not saying that, Hey, you should do that if you want to be the best, because everybody has a different personality and everybody has different needs.
"It's just good to stay open-minded. If you need that kind of help, then go for it. If you're up to it and if you're open-minded, I think it helps a lot."
Facing Kudermetova for the second time, the 20-year-old from Poland needed just 54 minutes to pocket the victory and go 2-0 against the Russian. Striking 19 winners to just 7 unforced errors, Swiatek did not face a break point in the match. Taking advantage of the warm conditions and high-bouncing playing surface, Swiatek lost just five points on serve, winning 28 of her 33 service points.
"I was just feeling pretty confident," Swiatek said on court after the match. "Again, as in my second round, my tactics worked pretty well. I just wanted to change the rhythm sometimes so she can get a chance to sometimes miss and in some points be offensive so she can feel the pressure.
"But basically, I wanted to make a gift for my psychologist because usually when I lose there is some drama. So let's just say she has the day off today."
Asked to reflect on her incredible 12 months since dominating Roland Garros to win her maiden major without dropping a set last fall, Swiatek said her sophomore season has surpassed all expectations.
"I felt like the first period of the year from January to June it was pretty tough because we had many Grand Slams, we had Olympics," Swiatek said. "I felt a lot of pressure.
"But here I feel kind of free because even though we have the WTA finals at the end, I feel like I reached my goals and I went even higher than our goals. So I'm pretty happy about that and I feel like I can play without any expectations and just feel myself on court, which is great."
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