She has won her last four tournaments, 20 straight matches and 40 sets in a row. And her name is not Steffi Graf.
If there was any doubt that 16-year-old Monica Seles of Yugoslavia is for real, just ask the latest victim of her two-fisted assault."I feel like I've been run over by a truck," Martina Navratilova said after losing 6-1, 6-1 to Seles in the final of the Italian Open on Sunday in Rome.
Navratilova is skipping the French Open again this year to prepare for Wimbledon, so she won't have to worry about facing Seles again soon.
But Graf may not be so lucky. Last year the West German, the world's top-ranked player, was shocked in the French Open final by 17-year-old Arantxa Sanchez Vicario.
But Seles' triumph in the $500,000 Italian Open has established her as Graf's main challenger at Roland Garros this year.
"It came at a great time," Seles said. "It gives me a lot of confidence going into the French Open."
The French, played on the same red clay as the Italian Open, begins in two weeks.
Seles, currently ranked fourth in the world, will take over the No. 3 spot in the next rankings from Sanchez, who lost in the third round here. With the absence of the second-ranked Navratilova, Seles will be seeded No. 2 in Paris behind Graf.
Graf squeezed past Seles 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 in the French Open semifinals last year.
The West German bypassed the Rome tournament, but the field included all the other top clay court players, including Gabriela Sabatini, Sanchez and 14-year-old American sensation Jennifer Capriati.
Seles was never tested during the week, losing only 14 games in five matches. The match against Navratilova was especially one-sided, lasting just 53 minutes. Seles won 20 of 23 points in one stretch.
Nothing that Navratilova tried worked. When she stayed back and hit offspeed shots, she either committed an error or gave Seles a chance to crack a winner with her two-handed forehand and backhand. When Navratilova rushed the net, Seles replied with net-skimming passing shots.
The match statistics told the story: 37 winners and six unforced errors for Seles, nine winners and 11 errors for Navratilova.
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At Hamburg, West Germany, unseeded Juan Aguilera of Spain scored a shocking straight-set upset over top-seeded Boris Becker in the final of the $1 million German Open tennis tournament.
Aguilera, the German Open champion in 1984, confused Becker with his touch play and a succession of superb passing shots in scoring a 6-1, 6-0, 7-6 (9-7) victory.
Becker, ranked third in the world, was outmaneuvered from early in the match. From 1-1 in the first set, the three-time Wimbledon champion lost 10 straight games to trail 6-1, 5-0 when rain held up play for an hour.
Whatever Becker tried, Aguilera, ranked 26th in the world, had the perfect answer.
If Becker came to the net, Aguilera passed him; if Becker stayed back, he was outrallied by the agile Aguilera taking the pace of the ball with accurate slices.
Many of the rallies included 20 shots or more, with Becker often making an error on the final shot.
The West German spent most of the first two sets shaking his head in amazement as the ball went zipping past him or he was caught flat-footed.
When the players returned from the rain delay, Aguilera served out to win the second set.
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At Kiawah Island, S.C., David Wheaton, playing in his first ATP Tour event since a leg injury sidelined him for more than two months ago, beat Mark Kaplan 6-4, 6-4 on Sunday to win the U.S. Men's Clay Court Championship, his first pro title.
The 48th-ranked Wheaton, who won four straight three-set matches to earn his way to the finals, downed No. 168 Kaplan before 2,845 on a humid and overcast afternoon at the East Beach Tennis Club.
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And at Gainesville, Fla., top-seeded Stanford rolled to a 5-1 victory over No. 2 seed and host Florida to capture the NCAA Women's Tennis Championships for the fifth straight season.