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Rafael Nadal watched Juan Martin del Potro's last shot sail wide on his fourth match point and collapsed flat on his back. He wasn't down for long, bouncing back up to celebrate his third title in four tournaments since coming back from a knee injury.
Nadal rallied from a set and 1-3 down in the second to win 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 in the BNP Paribas Open final on Sunday, capping an amazing 1½-month run since his seven-month layoff ended in February.
"Seriously, it's impossible to have better comeback, no?" he said, smiling. "Happy for everything."
Nadal improved to a career-best 17-1 on the year, including 14 straight match wins. He's won three titles -- two on clay while runner-up in another on his favorite surface -- and now his first on hard courts since Tokyo in October 2010. He had lost six previous finals on the surface.
"That's makes emotional week for me," he said. "Very important victory for me, winning against the best players of the world on a surface that is good for them."
Nadal won his 600th career match and will move to No. 4 in the rankings released Monday. He broke a tie with Roger Federer with his record 22nd career ATP Tour Masters 1000 title while earning $1 million for his third Indian Wells title.
"When you have one comeback like I'm having you remember all the low things, lower moments that you had during this seven months, doubts and all these things," he said. "The doubt when and where you will be able to be back on a tennis tournament is hard."
Read more http://espn.go.com/tennis/story/_/i...wins-indian-wells-first-title-hard-court-2010
