World No.8 Robin Soderling registered his first ATP World Tour victory of 2010 at the ABN Amro tournament in Rotterdam on Monday.
The Swede enjoyed a breakthrough season in 2009 but, suffering from elbow tendinitis, crashed out in the first round of the Chennai Open and the Australian Open last month.
He was a late entry into the Rotterdam event and it looked as though his poor run would continue when he lost the opening set to Frenchman Florent Serra but the third seed came through strongly in the end to triumph 4-6 6-4 6-1.
Fifth-seeded Spaniard Tommy Robredo had an easier time of it as he eased through to the second round with a 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 win over local wildcard Robin Haase.
German Florian Mayer needed nearly three hours to defeat Serbian Janko Tipsarevic 6-3 6-7 (6-8) 7-6 (8-6) while Italian Andreas Seppi saw off qualifier Stephane Bohli of Italy 6-1 7-5 and Dutch qualifier Ijor Sijsling came from behind to beat German Mischa Zverev 6-7 (2-7) 6-3 7-5.
Meanwhile Spain's Albert Montanes won his Brasil Open first-round clash with Germany's Simon Greul.
Montanes, the second seed behind compatriot Juan Carlos Ferrero, claimed a 6-2 7-6 (7-2) victory at Costa do Sauipe.
Daniel Gimeno-Traver, also from Spain, joined his compatriot in round two with a 7-6 (9-7) 6-1 win over another Spaniard, Santiago Ventura.
Wildcard Ricardo Mello of Brazil, meanwhile, claimed a 6-2 7-5 victory over Paolo Lorenzi of Italy to progress to the next round.
Filippo Volandri of Italy, Brazil's Rogerio Dutra Da Silva, Rui MacHado of Portugal and Argentina's Carlos Berlocq all won their final qualifying round clashes to enter the main singles draw.
And in the SAP Open in San Jose, fifth seed Tomas Berdych came through a tough clash with Wayne Odesnik to reach the second round.
The Czech Republic player cruised through the first set against his American opponent but then dropped the second before battling to a 6-1 6-7 (5-7) 7-5 victory.
In other first-round contests, Israel's Dudi Sela claimed a 7-6 (7-2) 7-6 (7-4) victory over Colombia's Santiago Giraldo and Jarkko Nieminen of Finland beat wildcard Lars Poerschke of Germany 3-6 6-3 6-2 to set up a clash with Berdych.
Leonardo Mayer of Argentina beat Ernests Gulbis of Latvia 7-5 6-4 and could face top seed and three-time champion Andy Roddick in round two.
Uzbekistan's Denis Istomin claimed a 6-2 7-5 victory over wildcard Ryan Harrison and Taylor Dent beat qualifier Alex Bogomolov Jr 6-4 7-6 (7-2) in an all-American clash.
An exhibition match featuring Pete Sampras saw the former world No.1 and 14-time major winner fall to a 6-3 7-6 (7-2) loss to world No.11 Fernando Verdasco.