Ivo Minar did his bit for the seeds? collective pride yesterday, breezing his way into the quarter-finals past a helpless Diego Junqueira.

The Czech number seven seed ? alongside Gilles Muller one of only two ranked players left in the tournament ? had little trouble knocking the last remaining South American out of the XL Bermuda Open, romping to a 6-2, 6-1 victory on a blustery Coral Beach centre court.

With play once again delayed by a morning of showers, action couldn?t get underway until a little after 1 p.m. - although it wasn?t long before the first set was complete.

Comfortably dominating his opponent, the baby-faced Minar was happy to hit winners early in the rallies, often finding himself mopping up with straightforward volleys to win 6-2 within 22 minutes.

And the Argentinian?s two games only came courtesy of mistakes by Minar, who effectively decided the majority of points himself ? either with forceful winners or through unforced errors.

For a small man, he generated plenty of power and there was little Junqueira could do to stop him.

The sunshine might have replaced the earlier squalls, but a strong cross-wind did little to help either player, although Minar coped much better, continuing where he had left off to race to a 4-1 lead in a man-against-boy second set.

The partial collapse of one of the electronic scoreboards on match point briefly delayed the inevitable but Minar took the second 6-1 to claim his quarter-final place within 45 minutes.

?That was very good tennis for me,? said Minar, still sweating in the humidity despite a post-match shower. ?I play well, hit the ball nice, no mistakes and very fast victory.

?I started the year not so good, but I am playing well here. He played like a typical Argentinian/Spaniard from the baseline and I just played how I wanted.

?This is the best I have done here (beaten in the second round last year) and I want to do more still.?

Minar?s victory was so swift, in fact, that Fernando Vicente arrived late on court for his clash with Zach Fleishman. He had no trouble with his timing during the match, however, racing to a 3-1 lead with two break points. But the American rallied and took the opening 51-minute set 7-5.

Spaniard Vicente ? with a quarter-final clash with Alex Bogomolov jr on the line ? fought back hard, winning the equally long second set in a tie-break.

The decider had the makings of another slugfest, but after half-a-dozen deuces on Fleishman?s serve, Vicente squeezed out the break with a delicate lob for 2-0. The American slipped on the clay during that point and at 3-0 required medical attention for his apparently injured right foot ? the delay extending match time close to two and a half hours.

Vicente pushed on from there, moving to leads of 4-0 and 5-2 before finally finishing off his opponent 6-2 with yet another break.

Keeping the theme of long games, another three-setter was required to separate Antony Dupuis and Amer Delic in the final singles of the day session. The Frenchman, who dumped out top seed Paul Goldstein in the opening round, eventually triumphed over another American 6-1, 1-6, 7-6 (4) in a see-saw affair and will now play Minar in the quarter-finals today.