Taylah Preston has advanced to the second round of the US Open for the first time. (Reuters: Imagn Images/Mike Frey)
Taylah Preston has advanced to the second round of the women's singles at the US Open for the first time.
Qualifier Storm Hunter was defeated by 11th seed Marta Kostyuk, while breakout Aussie Talia Gibson went down in three sets to Donna Vekic.
Adam Walton also bowed out early in the men's draw, missing two set points in the third set of a tight loss to China's Yibing Wu.
Taylah Preston is the first Australian into the second round of the US Open, claiming a straight-sets win over American Alycia Parks.
The 20-year-old from Western Australia, whose only previous second-round appearance in a grand slam was this year's Australian Open, produced a terrific performance to secure a 6-3, 6-3 victory.
The Australian faced three break points in the fourth game of the opening set, but was able to rally and level at 2-2. Preston then applied pressure to Parks's serve in the very next game, getting a 15-40 lead before winning the game on her second break point.
Preston broke Parks's serve in the ninth game to win the opening set.
Parks responded immediately by breaking Preston in the opening game of the second set.
Down 0-2 and facing, Preston roared back to win five games on the bounce, on her way to another 6-3 set win to close out the match.
Preston, world number 100, will either face Polish 20th seed Maja Chwalinska or American Taylor Townsend in the second round at Flushing Meadows.
A dejected Talia Gibson is doing her best to extract the positives after Donna Vekic crashed the rising star's US Open party in a rough start for the Australian contingent.
Talia Gibson went down in three sets to Donna Vekic of Croatia. (AP: Andres Kudacki)
Storm Hunter and Adam Walton also made early exits on day one at Flushing Meadows as Gibson was unable to disguise her anguish at an opportunity lost.
The 22-year-old rallied from a set and a service break down to look poised to claim her maiden grand slam victory outside Australia before Vekic steadied to post a 6-2, 4-6, 6-3 in two hours and 33 minutes.
