PARIS -- There are days in every profession when nothing seems to work. In tennis, those days usually result in defeat.

	Lindsay Davenport turned it around on Thursday stopping a streak of seven consecutive points lost.

On Thursday morning, Lindsay Davenport was struggling at the center court, Philippe Chatrier. When Uzbekistan's Iroda Tulyaganova pounded a forehand that caught the baseline, the 26-year-old American grimaced. She sighed. She took an extra long route to her serving position. Davenport trailed 4-5 in the first set and, after losing seven consecutive points, had three set points looming over her in the oppressive air.

"In the beginning, we were having very short rallies, one or two balls," Davenport said. "I didn't feel like I had the ability to keep four, five, six balls in, which you need to do in clay."

Her serve, previously dormant, suddenly made an appearance. Tulyaganova dumped the first one into the net. She was lucky to touch the second one. The third one, another would-be forehand, wound up in the net. Encouraged, Davenport, loosed two more big serves and walked away from what had looked like a certain disaster.

After drawing even at 5-all, Davenport came back to break Tulyaganova and close out the set. She won six of seven games in the second set and, in a spare 66 minutes, the No. 6 seed at the French Open was into the third round, 7-5, 6-1.

How, exactly, did it happen? How did Davenport stop a streak of seven straight points against her, then put together a streak of five in a row?

"More than anything, I probably lost my rhythm," Davenport said. "Once I lost it, I started rushing more, and it wasn't helping the cause. Started to slow down a little bit and tried to take my time and make a few (serves).

"You know, once it gets bad, I've got to keep staying positive on it and not just, you know, keep tanking on it."

Confidence. Willpower. The thing football coaches call want-to. In another word, the brain. It's remarkable: the very instrument that can allow an athlete to fall hopelessly far behind can be used to close the gap it created.

After young American Andy Roddick -- the men's No. 6 seed -- exited in the first round, he explained, "It's between the ears, man."

Lleyton Hewitt, the No. 1-ranked man in the world, is well-endowed with want-to. In fact, it is his best thing. When he was coming up a few years ago, there were those who didn't think the 5-foot-11, 150-pound Australian had the weapons to reach the top. Those people underestimated his desire to succeed.

	Lleyton Hewitt is No. 1 because he always wants it more.

On clay, Hewitt's strengths are neutralized more than some players because of his slight frame. He has difficulty with the high hops created by topspin. Although he's won Wimbledon and the U.S. Open, he has never advanced to the semifinals here.

And yet, when he has to kick it up a notch, a la Emeril LaGasse, Hewitt is able to do so. In a difficult match with Russian Nickolay Davydenko that saw 20 breaks of serve and, oddly enough, 20 holds, Hewitt was mentally tougher. Bam!

Davydenko, a strong clay-courter who made the finals last week in Austria, forced his way into a fourth-set tiebreaker and ran out to a 4-1 lead. That was when Hewitt steeled himself. At the same time -- and this is often a product of the champion's mindset -- Davydenko withered on the vine. He banged a forehand off his frame, missed a huge serve and pushed a backhand wide. Now, Hewitt was even, which was all the momentum he needed. Ultimately, Hewitt would win six of the last seven points in the tiebreaker and, after Davydenko went for too much on a forehand, moved through to the third round. "I felt like I was in control of the match the whole time," Hewitt said later, "but I couldn't quite finish it off."

Before the match, Davydenko said that Hewitt wasn't capable of winning the tournament.

"Yeah," said Hewitt, "I got more of a chance of winning it than he does."

Sometimes an athlete will reach for that next gear and there is simply no traction. That was James Blake's fate on Thursday.

He was caught in the middle of a 17-hour match -- his battle with Ivan Ljubicic was stopped around 9:30 p.m. on Wednesday when the light ran out -- and when Blake stepped back on Court 17 it was Thursday afternoon. Trailing two sets to one, Blake seemed out of sorts. Still, he managed to hold his serve all the way to 4-5.

But then, when he tried to ramp-up his serve as Davenport and Hewitt did, it didn't happen. At love-30, with the crowd clapping rhythmically in an attempt to bring him back, Blake had a brain cramp. Ljubicic tossed up a volley that Blake initially seemed to think was going out. But then, as it passed him, he thought differently and sort of swiped at it too late. That made it love-40. A forehand into the net sent him home.

"I just made too many errors at the end there," Blake said. "He's a guy that takes you out of your rhythm. Two matches on clay, I got about zero rhythm, which is pretty frustrating. So that took me out of my game, and so when it got down to crunch time, I didn't have the same confidence in my shots like I usually do." Like Hewitt, Davenport's best surface is not clay. It is, in fact, her worst surface -- by far.

"As far as being a true clay-court mover, there's no way I'm ever going to be able to do it," Davenport said. "I mean, I've tried, believe me. It's tough to get your balance and get your footing on clay because it's so slippery.

"I see people get my balls back that I know on a hard court would probably not come back. They slide 10 feet, they get them back, we start the point again."

For Davenport's next trick, she will play Frenchwoman Nathalie Dechy. Davenport is truly happy to be in the third round, and she has her willpower to thank.

"It was one of those days when you're lucky your opponent doesn't play great, and you're lucky to get through," Davenport said. "You're happy to get through. Just kind of did what I had to do to win that match."

Greg Garber is a senior writer for ESPN.com.