Pavlyuchenkova, Makarova jump in WTA rankings

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla., Feb. 3 (UPI) -- Russians Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and Ekaterina Makarova return to the WTA Top 25 after tournament wins.

Pavlyuchenkova and Makarova each improve their ranking five places with Pavlyuchenkova moving to 21st after winning the Open GDF Suez for her sixth WTA title and Makarova collected championship No. 2 at the PTT Pattaya Open.

Pavlyuchenkova defeated No. 5-ranked Maria Sharapova and seventh-ranked Sara Errani in the semifinals and finals in taking her third title since last April. Her No. 21 ranking is eight off her career best.

Makarova hadn't won a tournament since June 2010 before she beat Karolina Pliskova for the championship in Thailand. Now at 23rd, she's close to her career high of 19th in the rankings. Pliskova reaches a career-high 53rd this week, moving up 13 places.

Serena Williams has been No. 1 for 51 straight weeks, the 14th longest streak of consecutive weeks atop the rankings. She also owns the 13th longest such streak at 57 weeks, which is her personal best, and the 15th (49 weeks), which she passed last week. The record is 186 weeks by Steffi Graff.

Williams has opted out of this week's Fed Cup quarterfinal in which the United States takes on defending champion Italy. The other Fed Cup pairings for this weekend have the Czech Republic playing at Spain; Germany at Slovakia and Russia at Australia.

The Fed Cup winners advance to the semifinals April 19-20 with the finals set for Nov. 8-9.

With the Fed Cup on the calendar, the WTA is off but returns next week with Qatar Total Open.

The WTA Top 10, listing player's name, home country and ranking points:

1. Serena Williams, United States, 13,000

2. Victoria Azarenka, Belarus, 6,581

3. Li Na, China, 6,570

4. Agnieszka Radwanska, Poland, 5,750

5. Maria Sharapova, Russia, 5,600

6. Petra Kvitova, Czech Republic, 4,745

7. Sara Errani, Italy, 4,425

8. Jelena Jankovic, Serbia, 4,310

9. Angelique Kerber, Germany, 4,030

10. Simona Halep, Romania, 3,760