American top seed Andy Roddick held on to his RCA Championship title with a comfortable 6-2, 6-3 victory over Germany's Nicolas Kiefer on Sunday.
World number two Roddick became the first player to retain the title in Indianapolis since the great Pete Sampras had back-to-back victories there in 1991 and 1992.
| |||||||||||
The American left nobody in any doubt that he would control the match from the start just the day after he had to save three match points to beat Croat Ivan Ljubicic in the semi-final.
"I came ready to play today," Roddick told reporters. "Yesterday he (Ljubicic) was the one who took it to me early. Today, I forced my game."
It was Roddick's fourth tournament win of the year, after victories in San Jose, Miami and Queen's Club in London, and his third straight appearance in a final.
He reached this year's Wimbledon final where he lost to Switzerland's world number one Roger Federer.
Roddick was cheered on by a partisan crowd, which braved showers that delayed the start of the match for 20 minutes and caused a further delay of 13 minutes in the first set.
Kiefer has lost his last seven ATP finals since beating Mark Philippoussis in Hong Kong in October 2000. This year he has been beaten in finals at Scottsdale, Memphis and Los Angeles.
"I have to think positive," said 12th-seeded Kiefer. "I was working hard to find my game. I've worked hard to make the final but I was unable to raise my game another level.
The Indianapolis event, a hardcourt warm-up for the U.S. Open, is the second in the U.S. Open Series Bonus Challenge which links the performance of players in 10 designated tournaments to bonus prize money at the national Open.
Roddick earned 40 points with Kiefer getting 28.
