NEW DELHI: Ramkumar Ramanathan could not end India's 20-year-long title drought in singles on the ATP World Tour but the Chennai boy got close to the top-100 as he leapfrogged 46 places to a career-best rank of 115 after a runner-up finish at the Hall of Fame Open.
Ramkumar lost the title clash of the ATP 250 event 5-7 6-4 2-6 to American Steve Johnson in almost two hours last night.
The 23-year-old earned 150 points for a massive jump in his ranking and got richer by USD 52,340.
The last Indian to win an ATP singles trophy was Leander Paes, who incidentally had won on the grass courts of the same Hall of Fame tournament in 1998.
"It was a great week for me. I think I gave my best all throughout the week. Steve was hitting some good forehands today. I think he played a good third set and got the better of me," Ramkumar said after his match.
Yuki Bhambri continued to be the best-ranked Indian at number 86 despite a loss of one place.
Prajnesh Gunneswaran dropped two places to 186 and was followed by Sumit Nagal (269), Saketh Myneni (339, +18) and Arjun Kadhe (345, +16).
In the doubles, Rohan Bopanna was the top-ranked Indian at unchanged 27 and was followed by Divij Sharan (38, -2), Leander Paes (80, -5), Purav Raja (83, -2) and Jeevan Nedunchezhiyan (87, +4), N Sriram Balaji (96, +3) and Vishnu Vardhan (98, -6).
In the women's singles rankings, Ankita Raina returned to the top-200 following her title win in an ITF event in Thailand.
The next best was Karman Kaur Thandi at 232, a loss of 16 places.