en route to the finals. The finals was set for another top 2 seeded match as it was Azarenka facing world No. 2 Maria Sharapova for the fifth time of the year. Azarenka was able to win the match comfortably. The win gave Azarenka her second Premier Mandatory title of the year and fifth overall title of the year. Azarenka then played at the Generali Ladies Linz, where she advanced to the semifinals without dropping a set. In the semis she faced Irina-Camelia Begu, winning easily. In the finals she faced Germany's Julia Görges and won the match in straight sets, tying Serena with six titles for the year. Azarenka's final tournament of the year was the WTA Tour Championships where she was drawn in the red group along with world No. 3, Serena Williams, world No. 5, Angelique Kerber and world No. 8, Li Na. In match one she beat Kerber but was subsequently beaten by Serena Williams. In her final round robin match, she beat Li Na, ensuring her Year-End No. 1 ranking. As the runner-up of her group, Azarenka faced White Group winner Maria Sharapova in the semifinals. After, clinching the world number one spot in her previous match against Li, she seemed physically drained to compete well and lost to Sharapova in two sets. Azarenka set a new record for single-season prize money in 2012, earning $7.9 million. She also finished the season with a 69–10 win–loss record and six titles, losing five of those matches to Serena Williams, two to Maria Sharapova, one to Marion Bartoli, one to Dominika Cibulková and the remaining loss coming on a retirement to Tamira Paszek. Azarenka lost to Ekaterina Makarova in the second round of the Madrid Open. She reached the final in the Italian Open by defeating Julia Görges, Ayumi Morita, Sam Stosur, and Sara Errani, but lost to Serena Williams in the final. In the French Open, as the third seed, she reached the semifinal before she was defeated by Maria Sharapova, who ended the tournament as runner-up. In the first round of the Wimbledon Championships she defeated Maria João Koehler in straight sets, but suffered a knee injury early in the second set. Citing the injury, she withdrew from the Championships before her second round match against Flavia Pennetta. Following her injury-enforced early exit from Wimbledon, Azarenka returned to action at the Southern California Open, where