10 Things to Know, Day 4: Men's race for No. 2 moves into high gear

Trivia: This is the 800th straight week that one of the Big 4 is No. 1. Who was the No. 1 player on the ATP rankings 801 weeks ago, right before this streak began on February 2, 2004? Check back tomorrow for the answer.

The second round gets underway today

Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer are the biggest names in action at Roland Garros as the bottom half of the men’s and women’s draws play their second-round matches.

Nadal is playing his second straight German qualifier named Yannick

After beating German qualifier Yannick Hanfmann in the first round, the Spaniard will now play yet another German qualifier, Yannick Maden.

These are actually Nadal’s first two career matches against Yannicks. He has been playing since 2001.

Nadal is 21-1 in his career against qualifiers at Grand Slams

The 17-time major champion’s only loss to a qualifier at a Slam came against Dustin Brown in the second round of Wimbledon in 2015.

Nadal is 17-1 in his career against German players at majors

His only loss to a German player at a major came against—oh look, it’s Dustin Brown at Wimbledon again.

Federer is playing a lucky loser—he has never lost to one at a Slam

If lucky loser Oscar Otte somehow beats Federer, it will be a first—the Swiss is 4-0 against lucky losers at majors (all at Roland Garros).

If Federer wins today, it will be down to just him and Nadal for No. 2

A Federer win would mean Alexander Zverev and Stefanos Tsitsipas are out of the race for No.2—it would just be between the Swiss and the Spaniard.

Marin Cilic and Grigor Dimitrov were the No. 3 and No. 4 seeds last year—this year they play second round

They have both fallen down the rankings since a year ago, Cilic to No. 13 (he is the No.11 seed here) and Dimitrov to No. 46 (he is unseeded). Cilic leads the head-to-head series 4-1, but they have never met on clay.

The Karolina Pliskova-Kiki Bertens ace race is heating up

Pliskova is the WTA’s ace leader this year with 253 aces going into the second round here, but Bertens is right behind with 247—they both play today.

Pliskova will also become the WTA’s match-win leader if she wins today

If she can overcome the two-handed blasts of Kristina Kucova, it will be her 29th win of the year—breaking a tie at 28 with Kvitova.

Kei Nishikori is 12-1 against players at their home Majors

The only problem for Nishikori is that the only loss came against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the quarterfinals here in 2015—he plays him again today.

Trivia Answer from yesterday: Lopez played his record 69th consecutive major at Roland Garros this year—the only two men who joined him in both the 2002 and 2019 French Open draws were Federer and Gasquet.