Venus Moves On, Stosur & Zvonareva Cruise

After reaching the quarterfinals in her WTA comeback at the Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, Venus Williams took a few days to rest and came to Charleston fresh - and that was obvious on Tuesday, as she moved comfortably through to the second round of the Family Circle Cup with a 64 63 win over Iveta Benesova.



The 31-year-old Williams looked strong on serve against her fellow veteran Benesova, 29, getting broken in the first game of the match but never being broken again the rest of the way. "My serve felt great," Williams said after the victory. "I feel calmer here. I feel more match tough, as they say."Williams was one of eight players who won first round matches on Tuesday.The second round also began, with No.2 seed Sam Stosur and No.4 seed Vera Zvonareva among the winners. Stosur beat American Jamie Hampton, 60 75, though Hampton showed her toughness in fighting from 2-5 to 5-all in the second set before falling; Zvonareva took 50 minutes to drop some knowledge on Kateryna Bondarenko, 61 61.Stosur was the 2010 champion here; Zvonareva is a two-time runner-up here, in 2008 (losing to Serena Williams) and 2010 (losing to Stosur).Serena Williams, the 2008 Family Circle Cup champion was in action at night against Elena Vesnina, who was a finalist last year.