American wildcard John Isner unleashed 16 aces to edge past Italian Simone Bolelli 6-3 6-7 7-6 in the first round of the Pacific Life Open.

The six-foot-nine Isner, making his debut in the opening Masters Series event of the year, clinched the tiebreak 7-2 in the final set to secure victory in just under two-and-a-half hours.

"It was a lot of fun to play out there on the center court," Isner said after booking a place in the next round against fourth-seeded Russian Nikolay Davydenko.

"I like it here and I feel like I played pretty well. It was a really tight match and could have gone either way. I got a bit fortunate today."

Isner said the swirling winds at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden had been difficult to handle.

"Those were tough conditions and it was kind of tricky," the world number 92 said.

"My toss can get away from me so I think maybe heavy winds can kind of take away my serving advantage. But both players have to deal with it."

In other first round matches, Austria's Juergen Melzer beat former world number one Marat Safin of Russia 7-6 2-6 6-2 and Chile's Nicolas Massu battled past Serb Janko Tipsarevic 6-4 3-6 7-6.

American Sam Querrey, who won his maiden ATP title at last week's Las Vegas Open, defeated Chile's Luis Horna 7-5 6-3 to set up a second-round encounter with twice champion Lleyton Hewitt of Australia.

The top players enter the fray on Saturday when third-seeded Serb Novak Djokovic takes on Italy's Andreas Seppi and defending champion Rafa Nadal faces Santiago Giraldo of Columbia.

World number one and top seed Roger Federer, who was upset 6-3 4-6 6-0 in the second round last year by Argentina's Guillermo Canas, makes his first appearance on Sunday against Spaniard Guillermo Garcia-Lopez.

Reuters