Cramping, overcome by the steamy conditions, Vasek Pospisil still wins in his return to action in Atlanta

Canadian Vasek Pospisil has always struggled physically in the heat and humidity.

So the next two weeks, in Atlanta and Washington, D.C. as he returns to action for the first time since Wimbledon, are going to be a test even though he has made some inroads via changes in nutrition.

But Wednesday in Atlanta, with the temperature hovering around 35C (even more with the humidex), he had issues breathing, suffered from cramps and even fell over after his serve a couple of times.

Somehow, though, he managed to overcome the conditions and a tricky opponent in Yen-Hsun Lu of Taipei to prevail 6-4, 6-7 (3), 6-4 to reach the quarter-finals of the ATP Tour event.

He will face Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus on Friday, giving him an extra day to recover.

“Very tough conditions; very, very tough conditions. I was just happy to get through somehow," Pospisil told the media in Atlanta. “These are rare conditions, there aren’t conditions like this on the Tour very much. There are maybe just a handful of tournaments that can get this hot. I managed it well.”

Pospisil took a break after losing the second set in a tiebreak to gather his wits but when he came out for the third, it looked for all the world as though he wouldn't make it through, despite the encouragement of what appeared to be quite a big Pospisil cheering section in Atlanta.

He was called once for a time violation before his serve, but the chair umpire was pretty lenient on that score; he no doubt could have been penalized by the loss of a first serve on several subsequent violations.

At 4-4 in the final set, Pospisil survived a marathon game where he got in trouble with a double-fault at 15-30 to put him two break points down – a point he wouldn't have lost, had he challenged the call, because it touched the line. He saved several break points with aces – reaching up to 136 mph. When he finally held, he held up his arms in triumph and even managed a smile before heading to his chair, pumped some electrolytes into his sports drink and drained it in about 10 seconds flat.

When he came back out, hoping to break Lu's serve and end it, he had ditched his ballcap.

Three forehand errors by Lu later, the Canadian suddenly had three match points. On the third, Lu dumped a desultory double-fault into the bottom of the net to hand the match to Pospisil on a steaming hot silver platter.

“I literally gave every ounce of energy in that last game,” he said. “I’m not sure how I would have gone through had I not broken that last game.”