Breaking It Down: Williams vs. Sharapova There was a time not so long ago that clay court tennis demanded patience and guile, and the accepted strategy was a war of attrition. That time's done. Serena Williams is changing the way women's tennis is played, coached and written about, and her 6-4, 6-4 victory over Maria Sharapova in the Roland Garros final is another chapter in the new era of blast first, ask questions later. Williams has not bent the rules of the game - she has belligerently snapped them in half in her pursuit of the shortest rally possible with the most amount of miles per hour. For Williams, her perfect point is one that does not really exist at all. Williams seeks to end the point before it starts with an ace or a return winner or if she has to, a handful of laser-like ground strokes that are too hot to handle. Williams fired 29 winners to Sharapova's 10 in the final, including 11 forehand winners and 10 aces. Sharapova has now lost to Williams 13 straight times, but this contest showed promise for the Russian underdog. Sharapova led early, and at 2-0, serving at 40-15, she was raising a lot of eyebrows on Court Philippe Chatrier. It was about the best possible start Sharapova could have - especially after clawing back from 0-40 in the opening game of the match. Sharapova was always within a couple of points of making this contest very interesting, and it was a marked improvement over her 6-1, 6-4 loss to Williams in the final of Madrid earlier this year. Sharapova has only won one of the past 16 sets against Williams and has not gotten more than four games in any of the other 15. For Williams, her greatest asset is her serve. She finished ranked first in the tournament for aces with 41. That's 17 more than Sharapova, who finished a distant second. To give that perspective, only four players in the men's draw hit more aces than Williams for the fortnight, and the men's champion, Rafael Nadal managed only 29. Maybe Serena is playing in the wrong draw. Serena's fastest serve for the tournament was 124 m.p.h., which was exactly the same as the fastest serve Nadal hit in the men's final and faster than anything David Ferrer could manage. What is incredible is that with all the speed she possesses, Williams hardly ever double faults. She hit 10 for the entire tournament, while Sharapova hit 30. Nadal with 12 and Ferrer with 22 are once again statistically eating her dust. Williams only lost seven points total on her first serve against Sharapova in the final, and eight on second serves for the match. Sharapova won one out of 10 points when she returned Williams's first serve with a backhand. It's almost impossible to string together enough points at one moment in time to break her. Sharapova started fast and did manage to break Williams twice in the opening set, but Williams found another gear and did not face a break point in the entire second set. In fact, she won 16 of 19 first-serve points and 4 of 4 second serves in the second set. Her six aces in the second set were all hit down the middle, with five in the deuce court to Sharapova's backhand and one in the ad court to her forehand. At 6-4, 5-4, 40-15, Williams took the title with an ace down the middle to win her second Roland Garros title and 16th Grand Slam title over all. It's hard to beat what you can't touch. Craig O'Shannessy is the founder of the Brain Game, a tennis analysis company, and runs a tennis academy at the Polo Club in Austin, Tex. He can be followed on Twitter (@braingametennis).