CANBERRA, January 12, 2016

Four out of the five seeds were in action on Day 2 of the main draw at the $75,000 Canberra ATP Challenger and have progressed through to the second round. With temperatures hitting 36 degrees, player’s fitness was put to the test with several matches going the distance.

Top seed Paolo Lorenzi from Italy defeated fellow countryman Stefano Napolitano 6-4, 6-4. The world number 68 fired 11 aces and saved the only break point he faced to prevail in one hour and 29 minutes.

Sixth seed Diego Schwartman beat young Australian Alexei Popyrin in straight sets. Second seed Santiago Giraldo had a comfortable victory over Dudi Sela, winning 6-3, 6-3 in only 64 minutes.

Ivan Dodig won a tight match over Australia’s Dayne Kelly. After winning the first in a tiebreak, Dodig was down a break early in the second, but recovered to take the match 7-6, 6-4 after one hour and 27 minutes.

Eighth seed Taro Daniel was the only seed to fall on Tuesday, going down to Frenchman Quentin Halys in an epic three set battle that lasted almost three hours.

Australian’s Andrew Whittington and Matthew Ebden also featured in three set battles with mixed results. Whittington prevailed over Nikoloz Basilashvili to continue his good form after making the semifinals in Happy Valley last week. While Ebden went down to Spaniard Daniel Gimeno-Traver, 6-2, 6-7, 6-1 in one hour and 51 minutes, Max Purcell defeated fellow wildcard Daniel Hobart to record his first main draw win at the Challenger level, winning 6-1, 6-4 in just 52 minutes.

Second round action will be played on Wednesday, with the top 7 seeds all in action.