Fritz survives a match point in the quarterfinal, then needs five of his own to deny Jodar in Washington

Five. That is how many match points Taylor Fritz needed to close out Rafael Jodar in the Washington final, winning 7-6 6-4 for his 13th tour title and his first of the 2026 season. Jodar, 19 and ranked 24, saved four of them before the fifth finally landed.

The numbers through the final read close to even. Fritz landed 62 percent of his first serves to Jodar's 67, hit six aces to Jodar's five, and won 91 percent of his own service games to Jodar's 82. Total points went 55 percent to 45, 83 of 151 against 68, a gap thinner than the two-set scoreline suggests.

The first set went the full twelve games without a break and had to be settled in a tiebreak, which Fritz won 7-2. In the second, he broke to open the set, 1-0, and broke again for 3-0, only for Jodar to break straight back to 3-1 and keep the set alive. From there the set ran with serve to 6-4, and the closing was the hard part: Fritz stood one point from the title five times in all, and four of those points went Jodar's way before the last one landed.

It is Fritz's 13th tour title and his first of the 2026 season, his first since Eastbourne last year, and it followed an escape of his own: in the quarterfinal against Alex Michelsen, Fritz survived a match point and won the deciding tiebreak 8-6. For Jodar, 19 and ranked 24, it was a first defeat in a tour-level final rather than a first title chase; he already won in Marrakech this season, and reached the Washington final by beating Arthur Fils, seeded 8, then Kei Nishikori, Lorenzo Musetti from a set down, and Alejandro Tabilo. Fritz leads their head-to-head 1-0, after a straight-sets win over Jodar in Delray Beach in February.

Match tale, 3 August 2026, sources: Mubadala Citi DC Open, api-tennis