Venus Williams collected her sixth title of the year by overpowering Jelena Dokic in the final of the Acura Classic in California.

The top seed lost just four games on the way to winning the San Diego crown for the third successive year.

She has now won nine matches in a row since losing to her sister Serena in the Wimbledon final.

Serena opted against playing at the Acura Classic as the two sisters rarely play the same events in the build-up to the US Open.

But Venus admitted that her sibling is beginning to enjoy the competition after defeating her in the finals of the French Open and Wimbledon.

"She is crazy about beating me down nowadays," Williams said.

"Maybe she will give me a small break and I will be able to take something home for myself.

"I'm so proud of her. She's always my little sister so I'm still proud of her even if she takes it from me."

Williams will be defending champion at Flushing Meadows and said there was little for her to improve on before the final Grand Slam event of the year gets under way.

"Maybe just my consistency," she said. "Mentally I feel like I'm doing OK.

"I'm pretty focused on the court. My focus was to take the title home and now I can move forward."

Dokic, who had beaten second seed Jennifer Capriati on the way to the final, kept pace with the world number two for four games.

But after saving four break points in the fifth game the Yugoslav had no answer as Williams won 10 out of the next 11 points for the double-break.

Costly errors

Williams comfortably held serve to take the opening set and put her on the road to her 27th career title.

The 22-year-old American broke in the third game of the second set but Dokic refused to give in.

She finally broke the Williams serve in the sixth game of the second set, but costly errors ended her hopes of getting back into the game.

"I didn't expect to get to the final," Dokic said. "I've had a tough week. Hopefully next year I can come back and do a little bit better."

Williams, who has lost just one set in her winning run since Wimbledon, broke back in the seventh game and held serve to collect the $125,000 first prize.

Williams will remain in second place behind her sister when the WTA announce their latest rankings on Monday.