RIO DE JANEIRO -- Daniel Nestor is guaranteed a chance at a second trip to the Olympic podium 16 years after teaming up to win Canada's first, and so far only, tennis medal.
Nestor teamed with Vasek Pospisil to rout the Italian duo of Fabio Fognini and Andreas Seppi 6-3, 6-1 Tuesday at the Rio Games.
Toronto's Nestor and Vancouver's Pospisil put the game away in the second set when they broke the Italians to go up 4-1.
They broke the Italians again in the final game, winning on their fourth match point.
Nestor and Pospisil will face Spain's Rafael Nadal and Marc Lopez in the semifinal on Wednesday. The Spanish duo beat Austria's Oliver Marach and Alexander Peya i straight sets in another quarter-final.
Also Tuesday, the Canadian doubles team of Eugenie Bouchard and Gaby Dabrowski was eliminated after a three-set loss to the Czech Republic.
The 43-year-old Nestor has a chance to add to an impressive hardware collection that includes a memorable men's double gold from the 2000 Sydney Games. Nestor and Sebastian Lareau teamed up to beat the top-ranked Australian team of Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde 5-7, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6 (2).
Nestor has also won eight Grand Slam doubles titles on the ATP Tour with various partners over his career.
Bouchard, 22, of Westmount, Que., and Dabrowski, 24, of Ottawa took the opening set of their match 7-6 (4), but dropped the deciding two sets 6-2, 6-4 to Czechs Lucie Safarova and Barbora Strycova on Tuesday.
The match proved to be a see-saw battle, most notably in the eighth game of the third set.
Bouchard and Dabrowski had several opportunities to break serve down 4-3, but ultimately could not overcome Safarova and Strycova who held on to win the match.
Safarova and Strycova scored a huge victory to open the tournament with an upset win over defending Olympic champions Serena and Venus Williams of the U.S.
