Fonseca follows in Sinner’s footsteps with Lexington Challenger title

pa href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/joao-fonseca/f0fv/overview'Joao Fonseca/a etched his name in the record books Sunday when the 17-year-old became the youngest Brazilian to win an ATP Challenger Tour title./pp

The #NextGenATP star, who strengthened his claim on sixth in the PIF ATP Live Race To Jeddah, did not drop a set en route to his a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/scores/archive/lexington/586/2024/results'Lexington Challenger/a triumph. Competing in his second final at that level, Fonseca showed no signs of nerves as he defeated Australian a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/li-tu/tc01/overview'Li Tu/a 6-1, 6-4 to clinch the trophy. The teenager fell on his back in relief after securing the milestone victory./pp "Irsquo;m really happy to win my first title. It means a lot to me," Fonseca told commentator Bryan Fenley. "One year after of my first big title, which was the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/us-open/560/overview'US Open/a juniors. Irsquo;m really, really happy. It was not easy. Really hard work back home. I really want to thank my coaches, my parents, theyrsquo;ve supported me my whole life, not only incentivising me to play tennis, but also with being a good kid with maturity. Itrsquo;s really nice.rdquo;/pp

The a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/scores/archive/lexington/586/2024/results'Lexington Challenger/a has featured a trio of 17-year-old champions since 2019, including a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jannik-sinner/s0ag/overview'Jannik Sinner/a, current World No. 1, who won the hard-court event five years ago Sunday. Chinarsquo;s Shang Juncheng triumphed in 2022. Coincidentally, Fonseca is just one day younger than Sinner was when the Italian won in Lexington./p[ATP APP]p

The 2023 a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/us-open/560/overview'US Open/a boysrsquo; singles champion, who reached the quarter-finals at this yearrsquo;s tour-level events in Rio de Janeiro and Bucharest, is set to climb 48 spots to World No. 166 in Monday's PIF ATP Rankings, marking his Top 200 debut.nbsp;Fonseca is aiming for his maiden trip to the 20-and-under a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/next-gen-atp-finals/7696/overview'Next Gen ATP Finals presented by PIF/a, which runs from 18-22 December in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia./pp"I try not to think so much about ranking, just try to improve week after week, day by day," Fonseca said. "I just try to improve my game and to win matches. I try to develop not only as a player, but also a person."/ppFonseca is the seventh-youngest player from South America to claim a Challenger title and second-youngest from the continent to win a hard-court tournament at that level. Only a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/juan-martin-del-potro/d683/overview'Juan Martin del Potro/a was one month younger when he won a hard-court Challenger./ppstrongYoungest South American-born Players to win a Challenger title (since 1978)/strong/ptable tbody tr tdstrongPlayer/strong/td tdstrongAge/strong/td tdstrongTitle/strong/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/juan-martin-del-potro/d683/overview'Juan Martin del Potro/a/td td17 years, 1 month, 13 days/td td2005 Montevideo/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/horacio-de-la-pena/d008/overview'Horacio De La Pena/a/td td17 years, 1 month, 17 days/td td1983nbsp;Thessaloniki/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/juan-martin-del-potro/d683/overview'Juan Martin del Potro/a/td td17 years, 6 months/td td2006 Aguascalientes/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/gabriel-silberstein/s548/overview'Gabriel Silberstein/a/td td17 years, 9 months/td td1993 Ribeirao/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/mauricio-hadad/h256/overview'Mauricio Hadad/a/td td17 years, 10 months/td td1989 Bogota/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/juan-martin-del-potro/d683/overview'Juan Martin del Potro/a/td td17 years, 10 months/td td2006 Segovia/td /tr tr tdstronga href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/joao-fonseca/f0fv/overview'Joao Fonseca/a/strong/td tdstrong17 years, 11 months/strong/td tdstrong2024 Lexington/strong/td /tr /tbody/tablepp

In other ATP Challenger Tour action, a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/august-holmgren/h09n/overview'August Holmgren/a captured his second title in three weeks by triumphing at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/scores/archive/porto/9526/2024/results'Porto Open/a in Portugal, where the Dane defeated sixth-seeded Spaniard a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alejandro-moro-canas/m0ht/overview'Alejandro Moro Canas/a 7-6(3), 7-6(6) in the final./ppimg src="/-/media/images/news/2024/08/04/19/05/holmgren-portoch-2024.jpg" style="width:100%;" alt="a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/august-holmgren/h09n/overview'August Holmgren/a celebrates winning the Porto Challenger." /br /emsupa href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/august-holmgren/h09n/overview'August Holmgren/a celebrates winning the Porto Challenger. Credit: Lourenco A Rodrigues/sup/em/pp

A 2022 graduate of the University of San Diego who fell to a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/ben-shelton/s0s1/overview'Ben Shelton/a in that yearrsquo;s NCAA singles championship match, Holmgren saved a match point in Saturdayrsquo;s semi-finals against third seed a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/mikhail-kukushkin/k926/overview'Mikhail Kukushkin/a./pp

Following his title run, the 26-year-old is up to No. 167 in the PIF ATP Live Rankings, one spot behind Fonseca, setting the Dane up for a new career-high Monday. Two weeks ago, Holmgren won the Pozoblanco Challenger, his first title at that level./pp

Belgian a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/raphael-collignon/c0jp/overview'Raphael Collignon/a won his maiden Challenger title at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/scores/archive/luedenscheid/9542/2024/results'Platzmann Open/a in Luedenscheid, Germany. The 22-year-old rallied past top seed a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/botic-van-de-zandschulp/v812/overview'Botic van de Zandschulp/a 3-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the final. /ppa href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/hugo-dellien/da31/overview'Hugo Dellien/a collected his 12th Challenger title and second in the past month with a dominant run at the Svijany Open 2024 in Liberec, Czech Republic. The 31-year-old Bolivian dropped one set all week, overcoming Dane a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/elmer-moller/m0k4/overview'Elmer Moller/a 5-7, 6-4, 6-1 in the final./pblockquote class="twitter-tweet"p lang="en" dir="ltr"Liberec locked down ????a href="https://twitter.com/hugo_dellien?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@hugo_dellien/a secures his second title of the year, overcoming Moller 5-7, 6-4, 6-1 a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ATPChallenger?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#ATPChallenger/a a href="https://t.co/L4EhBL5iAj"pic.twitter.com/L4EhBL5iAj/a/pmdash; ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) a href="https://twitter.com/ATPChallenger/status/1820123605797155132?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"August 4, 2024/a/blockquotescript async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/scriptp[NEWSLETTER FORM]/p