Rafael Nadal returns to No. 3, Milos Raonic first Canadian in the top 10

Rafael Nadal beat Milos Raonic in straight sets for the Rogers Cup title. (Matthew Stockman/Getty Images) Rafael Nadal's remarkable 2013 season continues.

Courtney Nguyen | Aug 12, 2013

Rafael Nadal returns to No. 3, Milos Raonic first Canadian in the top 10 /

Rafael Nadal beat Milos Raonic in straight sets for the Rogers Cup title. (Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)

Rafael Nadal's remarkable 2013 season continues. Thanks to his triumphant run at the Rogers Cup in Montreal last week, Nadal returns to the No. 3 ranking for the first time in nearly a year this week.

It's an impressive rise considering he missed seven months after shutting down his season after Wimbledon last year. Since his return to the ATP Tour in February, Nadal has played 11 tournaments, made the final at ten of them, and won an ATP-leading eight titles (Djokovic and Murray are tied at No. 2 on that list with three titles each). Those titles include his eighth French Open title and four ATP Masters 1000s (Indian Wells, Madrid, Rome, and Montreal).

With no points to defend for the rest of the year, Nadal is in prime position to chase down Novak Djokovic for the year-end No. 1 ranking. He leads Djokovic by 1,420 points in the Race to London rankings, which tallies the number of points a player earns during the current season.

Published Aug 12, 2013

COURTNEY NGUYEN

Contributor, SI.com Nguyen is a freelance writer for SI.com, providing full coverage of professional tennis both on and off the court. Her content has become a must-read for fans and insiders to stay up-to-date with a sport that rarely rests. She has appeared on radio and TV talk shows all over the world and is one of the co-hosts of No Challenges Remaining, a weekly podcast available on iTunes. Nguyen graduated from the University of California, Irvine in 1999 and received a law degree from the University of California, Davis in 2002. She lives in the Bay Area.