Serena Shades Up (by Richard P)

The USTA brands its U.S. Open Series as the greatest road trip in sports. Serena Williams has spent the past six months spinning her wheels stuck in a self-imposed rankings pothole.

But after watching Williams surge past second-seeded Anastasia Myskina with a serve that reached a scorching 127 mph in Cincinnati on Tuesday night and seeing her hit harder than a demolition derby driver suffering from a severe case of road rage in last night's 6-3, 6-1 victory over Bethanie Mattek, opponents may soon demand the installation of speed bumps in service boxes of the blue U.S. Open Series courts to slow the woman who was once the driving force on the WTA Tour.

In a commanding comeback performance, Williams blew by the 11th-ranked Russian as if she were a hitchhiker stranded on the side of the expressway in a 6-2, 6-2, rout that spanned just 56 minutes.

"I was surprised," said the 2004 French Open champion, who dropped to 0-5 lifetime against Williams. "After six months, it's pretty hard to play (one's) first match. But she was pretty pumped. Serena hit the ball really hard."

Idling for six months, Williams has returned to the WTA Tour revving her competitive engine in treating two opponents like road kill. The rest of the Tour is already taking notice.

"It's great to see her back and playing well," Martina Hingis, six months into her own comeback, told Tennis Week today. "Definitely, everyone was surprised about her easy win against Myskina. It was good to see that."

The Serena who looked lost, outclassed, out of shape and out of sorts in her last match prior to Cincinnati - a 6-1, 7-6(5) setback to Daniela Hantuchova in the third round of January's Australian Open - has been supplanted by a streamlined Serena who has reached the Western & Southern Financial Women's Open quarterfinals looking like she's competing with her own personal map quest: she has a desired destination and the direction to reach it.

In recent years, Serena's concept of a pushing herself in a workout was pressing her