The 25-year-old Paes, who knocked out Swiss Marc Rosset in the opening round, maintained his giant-killing act by brushing past Bruguera 6-1, 6-2 to follow upon his equally one-sided 6-3, 6-0 first round victory.

Paes, ranked exactly 100 on the ATP computer and buoyed by his first singles title win at the Hall of Fame Grasscourt Tournament in Newport, Rhode Island is certain to go much beyond his previous best ranking of 98.

Paes who came through the qualifying rounds at this penultimate stop before the US Open, showed his prowess on the hardcourt by countering Bruguera, reputed for his superb groundstrokes, for the easy win.

Paes partners Mahesh Bhupathi in the doubles where the duo, given a first round bye, meet winners of the Wayne Arthurs/Peter Tramacchi and DanielOrsanic/Jan Siemerink, in the second round. Top seed Pete Sampras allowed Lleyton Hewitt to break him twice and force a tie-breaker before dismissing the young Australian 6-1, 7-6 (7-4) to advance to the third round.

2nd Round Results (seeding in prefix)

Leander Paes (India) bt Sergei Bruguera (Spain) 6-1, 6-2, 1-Pete Sampras (US) bt Lleyton Hewitt (Aust) 6-1, 7-6 (7-4), 3-Petr Korda (Czech Republic) bt Andrei Medvedev 6-3, 2-6, 6-1, 5-Yevgeny Kafelnikov (Russia) bt Todd Woodbridge (Aust) 6-0, 6-3, 11-Gustavo Kuerten (Brazil) bt Alex O'Brien 6-3, 6-2, Davide Sanguinetti (Italy) bt 12-Fabrice Santoro (France) 6-1, 6-7 (7-2), 7-5, 6-Tim Henman (Britain) bt Vincenzo Santopadre (Italy) 6-2, 6-3

Corretja up

INDIANAPOLIS: Spain's clay court contingent scored second-round success on hard courts yesterday with Alex Corretja and Francisco Clavet advancing at the $1 million RCA Championships.

Sixth seed Corretja ousted Australian Scott Draper 6-3, 6-7 (2-7), 7-5 while thirteenth-seeded FranciscoClavet knocked out German Tommy Haas 6-4, 6-0.

2nd Round Results (seedings in prefix)

Hicham Arazi (Morocco) bt 10-Felix Mantilla (Spain) 6-2, 4-6, 6-4, Jason Stoltenberg (Aust) bt Jonas Bjorkman (Sweden) 7-5, 6-3, Ramon Delgado (Paraguay) bt 9-Cedric Pioline (France) 7-6 (7-3), 6-1, 11-Mark Philippoussis (Aust) bt Adrian Voinea (Romania) 7-5, 6-4, 14-Wayne Ferreira (S Africa) bt Jiri Novak (Czech Republic) 7-6 (7-3), 6-2

Easy for Hingis

MONTREAL: Top seed Martina Hingis defeated 59th-ranked Sylvia Plischke of Austria 6-4 6-1 in second-round action at the $926,500 Canadian Open on Wednesday.

Wimbledon champion Jana Novotna (Czech Republic), riding a three-tournament winning streak, downed Russia's Elena Likhovtseva 7-5, 6-2 to run her consecutive match victory streak to 17.

In other matches, Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario (Spain) struggled with her serve on a windy centre court in a 0-6, 7-5, 6-2 victory over Karina Habsudova (Slovakia), Anna Kournikova (Russia) rallied to down RuxandraDragomir (Romania) 4-6, 6-2, 6-4 and Nathalie Tauziat (France) overcame Kimberly Po (US) 6-3, 6-3.