No. 13 seed Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia retired from her match against Alina Jidkova of Russia due to heat illness. No. 8 Mary Pierce of France withdrew from the tournament due to a strained right quadriceps. It's the same injury that forced her to drop out of the JP Morgan Chase Open in Los Angeles last week.
Pierce is the fifth top-20 player to withdraw from the event in the past week. On Sunday, top-seeded Russian Maria Sharapova backed out due to a strained chest muscle. Venus Williams, ranked ninth in the world, withdrew last week due to the flu.
Rafael Nadal's 16-match winning streak fell against another teenager who knows him well.
The 19-year-old Spaniard wasted three match points while losing to Tomas Berdych 6-7 (4), 6-2, 7-6 (3) on Tuesday night, the first notable upset of the Cincinnati Masters.
The second-seeded Nadal was worn down from his first hard-court title.
The French Open champion beat Andre Agassi in Montreal on Sunday for his tour-leading ninth ATP win of the year, and didn't have much time to get used to the conditions in Cincinnati.
He came up one point short in a match that lasted 2 hours, 57 minutes.
"I don't have good luck in the match points," Nadal said.
Lleyton Hewitt shook off the effects of a severe stomach virus, and Russia's Marat Safin struggled with an aching knee while advancing in their opening matches Tuesday. Berdych's repeated escapes on a muggy night provided the day's best drama.
The 19-year-old Czech survived five break points to keep the third set knotted, then overcome three match points to send it to the tiebreaker, where Nadal double-faulted twice.
Berdych had beaten only one Top 10 player in his career -- he's now 2-8 against them -- but wasn't intimidated by an opponent who is the same age and needed three sets to beat him last month at Bastad.
"I've known him for so long," Berdych said.
"I saw him when he was 12. He was in the same tournament. We know each other so well."
The third-seeded Hewitt beat Igor Andreev 6-3, 6-4 on a muggy afternoon that tested his stamina. A week earlier, the Australian had to quit a first-round match in Montreal because of the stomach ailment -- the first time he's ever given up.
Steady rain delayed the day's opening matches by 2 hours, forcing organizers to scramble the schedule.
Three other seeded players lost their opening matches Tuesday after the long rain delay -- No. 8 Gaston Gaudio and No. 10 Mariano Puerta of Argentina, and No. 13 Thomas Johansson of Sweden.
Agassi had to pull out of the tournament because his chronic back problem flared up, but hopes to be ready in a couple of weeks for the US Open.
Federer, Hewitt and Safin also are heading into the Open with less time on the court than they'd like -- not that Hewitt thinks it will matter to the favorite.
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