Ivo Karlovic of Croatia established a US Open record Tuesday when he recorded 61 aces on his way to a five-set first-round victory over Taiwan’s Yen-Hsun Lu.
The 37-year-old is no stranger to aces, having served more than 11,000 of them in his ATP career. Karlovic banged down 22 in the second set alone, topping Lu 4-6, 7-6 (4), 6-7 (4), 7-6 (5), 7-5. The 61 aces smashed the previous Flushing Meadows record of 49 by Richard Krajicek in 1999.
“I knew there were a lot of aces because at one stage I was serving one on almost every point but I didn’t know it was a record,” Karlovic told reporters afterward.
Only 10 of the 61 aces came in the final set.
“I’m getting old,” he said.
