Phil Coale / AP

Lindsay Davenport celebrates her win over Silvia Farina Elia. The world's No. 1 ranked player won the Amelia Island Championship on Sunday for the third time.

updated 6:21 p.m. ET April 10, 2005

AMELIA ISLAND, Fla. - Maybe Lindsay Davenport’s clay-court success at Amelia Island will finally carry over to the French Open.

Davenport’s powerful serve helped her offset 36 unforced errors and beat Silvia Farina Elia 7-5, 7-5 Sunday to win the Bausch & Lomb Championships for the second consecutive year.

“This is a huge win for me,” Davenport said. “Whenever I can win on clay and in a really tough tournament, it gives me a lot of excitement.”

It also could give her more confidence heading into the French Open next month. Davenport hasn’t reached the quarterfinals at Roland Garros since 1999. The French also is the only Grand Slam that eludes the 28-year-old Californian, who won the U.S. Open in 1998, Wimbledon in 1999 and the Australian Open in 2000.

The cushy, green clay at the Amelia Island Plantation has been much more kind.

Davenport won here in 1997 and then again last year. She joined Martina Navratilova, Chris Evert, Steffi Graf and Gabriela Sabatini as the event’s only three-time winners.

“For me, I’m playing my best when I’m playing hard-court tennis on clay,” said Davenport, who followed both previous clay-court victories in this event by losing in the round of 16 at the French. “I don’t want to just get balls in and build points. The shorter the point, the better.”

Davenport trailed 5-4 in the second set, but broke Farina Elia twice to capture her 47th career singles title. She took advantage of four unforced errors by the 32-year-old Italian to even the set at 5, then held serve to move ahead 6-5.

Davenport missed her first chance to clinch the match when Farina Elia reached a crosscourt drop shot and returned it to an open court. But Davenport bounced back two points later with a forehand winner that landed just inside the end line.

Davenport won a crystal bowl and $93,000 to go along with her title at the tour’s first clay-court event of the year. She also became the first player this season to accumulate more than $1 million in prize money.

“I did all I could today,” Farina Elia said. “Lindsay came up with unbelievable points at big times in the game.”

Davenport finished with seven aces and 48 winners, but she also had four double faults and had her serve broken five times.

“I really felt like I was being forced into a whole lot of errors because she would get balls back and be on the offensive and mix it up with hard shots and drops shots and ankles,” Davenport said. “She was the reason I didn’t play my best.”

Davenport will play two more tournaments — the Family Circle next week in Charleston, S.C., and the Fed Cup the following week — then take time off before heading to Paris.

Although she admittedly prefers hard-court tennis, Davenports insists her schedule has more to do with her success than the surface.

She believes that spending too much time overseas before the French makes her homesick and eager to return to the states.

“People have their opinions of what they think is best for me,” she said. “But I know myself pretty well and I know the best shot I have at the French is starting off in Paris and just going from there. Being in Europe for three of four weeks prior is not going to make for a happy Lindsay. I don’t play well when I’m not happy.”

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