Louise Hunt has returned to the world's top 20 this week in the women's singles wheelchair tennis rankings published by the International Tennis Federation after finishing runner-up in last weekend's Biel-Bienne Indoors in Switzerland, where she also secured the best individual match win of her career.
The 19-year-old Wanboorough athlete, who is a Sports Performance and Science student at the University of Bath, did not have the easiest draw, but opened with a 6-3, 6-2 victory over Switzerland's world No 24 Parmila Grangier, the player she had just edged out for the fourth seeded spot at the tournament.
Hunt then came from 1-4 down and 30-40 down in the second set of her quarter-final against Austria's Henriett Koosz to prevail 6-3, 6-4 and earn a semi-final against German top seed Katharina Kruger. World No 12 Kruger subsequently became the highest ranked opponent that British No 3 Hunt has beaten during her career as the Briton got the better of a roller coaster of a match to progress to the final 6-1, 0-6, 6-2.
A second match in a year against German third seed Sabin Ellerbrock provided a tough mental and physical challenge for Hunt, who had been unable to take a game off Ellerbrock when they first met in Germany in 2010. However, despite slipping to a 6-4, 6-1 loss this time, Hunt was more than happy with her week's work.
"Although I lost today, I certainly wasn't disappointed with the way I played and can take a lot of positives away from the match, such as coming from 5-1 down in the first set," said Hunt, a part of the Tennis Foundation's Wheelchair Tennis Performance Programme. "I had a point to make it 5-5 and then saved three match points in the second set when I was 5-0 down before taking that game, but Sabine is just a very good player.
"All-in-all it's been a very good week and I'm proud of how I've coped with some tricky situations. After recovering from the verge of going 5-1 down in the second set of my quarter-final and then pulling myself back together after losing the second set against Katharina 6-0 in the semi-finals to gain the biggest match win of my career, it's good experience I can draw on in the future.," added Hunt, whose successes over the past year and ambitions to try and reach the London 2012 Paralympics attracted additional support from the local Swindon branch of Goldsworthy's hairdressing salon last autumn.