The Wimbledon champion enters Roland Garros as a favourite for the women's title after an impressive start to the year in which she has reached the semifinals of the Australian Open and landed titles in Tokyo and Doha.

Her claycourt preparation has been steady if not spectacular with a quarte-final showing in Berlin and a semifinal berth in Rome and the Russian world number two feels her claycourt game is coming together at just the right time.

"I think I've had a pretty good preparation," the 18-year-old said last week. "You know, I'd rather play well -- play better at a Grand Slam (than at the warm-up events) and just learn the things I need to work on and keep working on them the next week..

. hopefully (I will) be fresh and ready for Roland Garros."

The willowy Russian said she had been improving her stamina with one eye on the gruelling claycourt Grand Slam.

"This is not an overnight process. I'm not going to change overnight and all of a sudden be Superman and win everything," she smiled.

"But I think I'm a lot better than I was last year in the claycourt season, and that's an improvement. And little by little..."

Last year she fell in the quarterfinals but that was before she took the tennis world by storm with a spectacular victory at Wimbledon.

Sharapova can expect to be seeded second by the French organisers, behind world number one Lindsay Davenport, and will fancy her chances of success -- certainly more so than compatriot and defending champion Anastasia Myskina.

Myskina has been struggling with a nagging shoulder injury which cast doubt over her participation in Paris. Earlier this week she said she would attempt to defend her crown but her coach Jens Gerlach knows it is not just her shoulder which needs fixing.

"She's not the type of person who makes excuses for anything," Gerlach told Reuters, adding that she also needed to rediscover her inner fire.

"She's been a champion and knows how to dig deep like a champion," he said. "If she gets to Paris and wins a couple of good matches, maybe she'll feel the magic of Roland Garros again."

Former champion Justine Henin-Hardenne also hopes to feel the magic of Roland Garros.

"The French Open is something very special for me. I did my best there, I did my worst there," she said last week.