Rafa warm-up helps Hewitt

The Australian, who hit with the Spanish clay court supermo the day before the match, broke Chela in his opening service game and hardly looked back as he went a set and a break up.

He was briefly in trouble as Chela clawed the break back and the former world number one had to save two set points when 5-6 down. He managed to hang in and force a tie-break, winning it 7-3 with a punched half-court forehand on match-point.

Hewitt, the former world number one, came into the 2.1 million euros clay-court tournament with just one match under his belt in two months.

After two victories over crafty claycourt players -- he beat another Argentine, Agustin Calleri in the first round -- he was highly pleased with his start in Hamburg.

"I played very well," Hewitt, who now rates himself fully fit, said at a news conference. "I stepped up another notch form the first round."

"The practice with Nadal was good," added Hewitt, who is the 16th seed in Hamburg. "He's the stand-out player on this surface. Roger is great on any surface but Nadal takes it to another level on clay, and I feel I hit it well with him."

Hewitt will go on to face either Russia third seed Nikolay Davydenko or Frenchman Gilles Simon in the third round.

Whether he seeks a partnership with Australian coach Tony Roche, who recently split with world number one Roger Federer, remains to be seen.

"It's something I'll look at, but I'm sure Tony's got a lot of things going through his mind as well," Hewitt said.

"Rochey's a hell of a coach, if not the best guy around. I was lucky enough to get a helping hand from him in the Davis Cup when I was very young. I've got a lot of time for him."