Andy Murray moved level with Tim Henman's British career-wins record after beating France's Adrian Mannarino in straight sets at Indian Wells.
Murray eased past Mannarino 6-3, 6-3 in California to book a quarter-final match-up with Spain's Feliciano Lopez who edged past Japan's Kei Nishikori.
The victory means Murray has now equalled Henman's 496 career wins, which represents an Open era record for a British man.
Murray was made to work hard by Mannarino's aggressive ground strokes but the Frenchman was too inconsistent and Murray took full advantage.
A double fault in Mannarino's first service game presented the world number four with a break point but Mannarino held his nerve on a high smash and sealed the game unscathed.
The first break of the match arrived soon after but it was Mannarino who took it, as this time Murray's second serve went long to give his opponent a surprise 3-2 advantage.
A superb forehand pass from Murray in the following game, however, seemed to jolt the Scot into life as he won the next three games in succession to lead 5-3.
Mannarino continued to come on the offensive, pinning his opponent back with an aggressive forehand, but Murray was clinical on the counter-attack and sealed the first set in 45 minutes.
The second began as tightly as the first as Mannarino halted Murray's momentum with two holds of serve and the world number 38 could have broken at 2-2 but squandered two break points.
Mannarino allowed his frustration to get the better of him in the following game and a wild forehand wide gave Murray the decisive break and a 4-2 lead.
With victory in sight, Murray showed no signs of letting up and another Mannarino unforced error at 5-3 allowed the Scot to convert a second match point and seal a convincing win.
Murray praised Mannarino after the match, admitting the 26-year-old had proven a difficult opponent.
"It was a very tough match, he's playing very well this year and he's got a very tricky game," Murray told Sky Sports.
"He's a lefty but he has a very flat backhand and a short take-back on his forehand so it's hard to read.
"He moves well and he has good hands around the net - in both sets though he played one or two loose games which helped me and I stayed solid throughout.
"I was frustrated to get broken in the first set, I thought I started well but he came out firing.
"I tried to make a lot of balls and he didn't play a great game in the next game and that stopped his momentum.
"I started to feel more comfortable after that and went for my shots more."
On equalling Henman's record, Murray joked: "That's one of the few records Tim still had over me.
"I wasn't actually aware of the record so that's nice. Hopefully I can get through the next round and get past him."
Earlier Murray was among some of tennis's big names who were far from sad to see Wayne Odesnik retire from the sport after the US pro was hit with a huge ban for another failed drugs test,
Odesnik, who is 29 years old and ranked 267th in the world, tested positive for a number of banned substances including steroids after providing samples on December 17 and January 12.
The suspension will last 15 years and is back-dated to commence from January 30, ending January 29, 2030.
The International Tennis Federation has also determined that Odesnik's results at the Happy Valley Challenger event, Australian Open and Maui Challenger event should be disqualified as well as any ranking points or prize money earned in those tournaments.
Murray appeared to voice his approval for Odesnik's latest ban, tweeting: "Bye bye Wayne... Good riddance".
A USADA statement read: "The Tennis Anti-Doping Programme (the "Programme") and the United States Anti-Doping Agency ("USADA") jointly announced today that Wayne Odesnik has committed a second Anti-Doping Rule Violation."
It continued: "Mr Odesnik's commission of an Anti-Doping Rule Violation under Article 2.1 of the Programme was confirmed, which was his second such violation, having been sanctioned in 2010 for the possession of human growth hormone.
"It was, therefore, determined that he is suspended from participation for a period of 15 years, back-dated to commence from 30 January 2015, and so ending at midnight on 29 January 2030."
Odesnik was previously sanctioned in 2010 for possession of human growth hormone but he denied ever taking the performance-enhancing drug.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article