Zheng Jie became the first Chinese player to reach the fourth round of a Grand Slam when she beat Tathiana Garbin in the French Open in Paris.
The 21-year-old dropped a tight first set but raced through a second-set tiebreak 7-1 to level the match.
She then took advantage of the growing fatigue of her Italian opponent for an historic 5-7 7-6 (7-1) 6-2 win in two hours and 30 minutes.
The Chinese woman, world-ranked 58, will now play 14th seed Paola Suarez.
The previous best performance by a Chinese player had come when Li Fang reached the third round of the 1992
Australian Open.
"I think the difference today was endurance. I work on my
conditioning at home for an hour a day," said Zheng.
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