Second-seeded Caroline Wozniacki clawed her way into the third round of the BNP Paribas Open on Friday as women's seeds swung into action in the hardcourt tennis tournament.

The Dane, who shot to prominence with her runner-up finish at last year's US Open, rallied from 1-4 down in the third set to beat American Vania King 5-7, 6-2, 6-4.

"I just kept fighting for every point," the world number four said after pulling off the victory in 2hrs 28min. "Vania was playing really, really good. I'm just glad I came through."

Wozniacki said she hoped her first-round tussle would stand her in good stead in her next match, against either 32nd-seeded Maria Kirilenko of Russia or unseeded Frenchwoman Virginie Razzano.

"For sure I got some points in play today, and I got to run and I got to try a little bit of everything - from playing well, to playing not so well, to playing OK," she said. "Hopefully that can make me stronger for the next round."

Fourth-seeded Russian Elena Dementieva also needed three sets to advance, downing Olga Govortsova of Belarus 6-4, 4-6, 6-0, while fifth-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland had a relatively quick day on court, advancing when Russian Anna Chakvetadze retired with Radwanska leading 6-2, 5-3.

After all 32 seeded players enjoyed first-round byes, Chinese seventh seed Li Na and Russian 10th seed Maria Sharapova were among the women opening their campaigns on Friday.

Meanwhile on the men's side, the first-round continued in the year's first ATP Masters 1000 event, with American James blake among those advancing.

Blake defeated spain's Dainel Gimeno-Traver 6-3, 6-2 to line up a second-round meeting with 13th-seeded Spaniard David Ferrer.

Taiwan's Lu Yen-Hsun beat Spain's Oscar Hernandez 6-1, 6-2 to line up a clash with seventh-seeded American Andy Roddick.

Roddick played tournaments in San Jose and Memphis last month but opted out of the first round of the Davis Cup, in which the United States fell in Serbia. He said he was energized by the strong field - headed by world number one Roger Federer and including Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray.

Federer and Nadal are both playing for the first time since their fortunes diverged at the Australian Open - where Federer claimed his 16th Grand Slam title and Nadal retired while trailing in his quarter-final against eventual runner-up Murray with a knee injury.

"You know, after Australia we all kind of go and play our own kind of schedule. We have our own agendas," Roddick said. "This ... you kind of get the sense of being at a really, really big event again."