How She Got to No. 1

Maria Sharapova fibs. "I'm just a normal girl," she giggles. Sharapova, 18, the blond, leggy, Russia-born, Florida-raised tennis pinup is the No. 1--ranked player in the world heading into next week's U.S. Open. Sure, like a normal girl, Sharapova is a bit of a mall rat. But a normal girl doesn't morph into the highest-paid female athlete on the planet in one year. She doesn't have a corporate sponsor like Motorola throw her 18th-birthday party at a swank Manhattan nightclub, pack it with 500 people and hire Maroon 5 to rock out. And a normal girl certainly doesn't walk the tightrope between sports and sex, sparking a mini-furor at a Toronto tourney because her two stadium banners were a tad too revealing.

Here's some truth: since her surprise win at Wimbledon 14 months ago, Sharapova has aced the pundits who thought she would be a one-stroke wonder, mixing a rare brand of off-court glam and on-court grit to earn the world's top spot. Remember, we have heard a story like this before. A beautiful Russian prodigy, reared at a Florida tennis factory, splashes onto the scene--and claims more magazine covers than she does trophies. But while Anna Kournikova treated tennis as if it were a pushy paparazzo, the game is Sharapova's Prince Charming.

Sharapova leads one of the deepest U.S. Open fields in the history of women's tennis. The slam sisters, Serena and Venus Williams, will be formidable, as will new No. 2 Lindsay Davenport. Behind them lurks a horde of Sharapova's fellow Russians, including defending U.S. Open champ Svetlana Kuznetsova and Elena Dementieva; Belgians Kim Clijsters and Justine Henin-Hardenne; and France's Amélie Mauresmo. Any one of them could win the Open. The men's game, on the other hand, has been dominated by the silent Swiss Roger Federer. The only mystery concerns who will be Federer's stompee in the final.

To get to the top spot, Sharapova steadily piled up points this summer while Davenport nursed injuries. Sharapova is consistent, having won six tournaments since her triumph at Wimbledon, and she reached the quarters and two semifinals in this year's three Grand Slam events. But her quick rise--from No. 324 to No. 1 in three years--has surprised everyone, even the typically self-assured Sharapova. "It's actually shocking," she tells TIME. "Before I was trying to lay off the whole thing, saying, 'I'm not worried about it, it's not important.' But you know, once you get there, it's, like, wow!"

Just as important, she learned to say no. After winning Wimbledon, she rejected offers to present at award shows and pose for laddie magazines. She turned down dozens of endorsement contracts. She did ink nine deals with the likes of Motorola, Nike, Colgate-Palmolive and Canon that with her court winnings amount to more than $20 million in annual income. But her agent, Max Eisenbud, and a 25-person "Team Sharapova" at sports-rep firm IMG gave the corporate sponsors just three weeks this year with her.