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This is Scientific American 60 Second Science. I'm Suzanne Bard.

This July, just one year after turning pro, 15-year-old Coco Gough beat tennis superstar Venus

Williams in the first round at Wimbledon. She went on to win two more rounds against

highly ranked players during the tournament.

Similarly, in 2009, 17-year-old Melanie Odin beat a series of top-ranked opponents,

making it to the fifth round of the US Open.

How did these newcomers do so well?

One factor, in addition to stellar play, could have been their meteoric rise in status,

both prior to and during the tournament.

Opponents seeing the newbies' names climb in the rankings might have been somewhat psyched out.

It's a phenomenon that Duke University researcher Haymont Cocker calls status momentum.

If that person is carrying momentum, you tend to feel more threatened or intimidated by their momentum

and as a result your performance is impaired.

Kocker and his colleagues analyzed more than a hundred thousand matchups between

tennis pros and millions of amateur chess games.

They found that players fared worse

when facing opponents who are rising in rank.

And it's not just that the rise in rank

reflected higher skills.

...