The Hindu : Horne equals course record

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Mar 26, 2004

Sport

Sport - Golf

Horne equals course record

By Rakesh Rao

— Photo: Sandeep Saxena

Keith Horne in action.

NEW DELHI, MARCH 25. It needed a record-equalling round of nine-under 63 from South African Keith Horne to bring the Royal Challenge Indian Open golf tournament to life.

Three strokes ahead of Thailand's Thaworn Wiratchant and four better than Mukesh Kumar and Shamim Khan, Horne duplicated the first-round effort of Myanmar's Zaw Moe in last year's Open at the Delhi Golf Club here.

Defending champion Mike Cunning was tied for the 29th spot with 17 others including the 2002 champion Vijay Kumar. Another American, Greg Hanrahan was sharing the 20th place with Gaurav Ghei, S.S.P. Chowrasia and Roop Singh, among others.

On a day when 45 players returned sub-par scores, Wiratchant took the turn with a 32 and covered the back nine in 34 to come up with the second best card of the day. A three-time winner on the Asian Tour, Wiranchant has been in fairly good form this year having finished tied-10th in the Thailand Open and joint-eighth in the Malaysian Open.

Interestingly, out of the five players who returned cards of 67 or under, only Clay Devers bogeyed. The American more than made up for his three bogies on the re-laid third, ninth and 13th greens by sinking eight birdies.

Indeed, the day belonged to Horne. He came delightfully close to shattering Moe's record but the 12-foot birdie putt on par-4 ninth hole, his last for the day, lipped out. Still, the 32-year-old from

Johannesburg did not mind the close miss and described the round as "perfect on a difficult course.''

Needless to say, Horne putted well all day with five birdies coming on the front nine. Out of the four par-five holes, where Horne chose to use the 3-wood, he birdied three. One of his longer birdie-putts came on the 15th where Horne drained a downhill putt from15 feet.

Horne's iron-play was no less impressive. On the par-five eighth, the only hole where he missed the fairway, unleashed a 6-iron from 235 feet to find the green. He two-putted for what turned out to be his final birdie of the day.

"Today's was one of the best rounds I've played as a professional,'' said Horne whose previous 63 came in the third round of the Dunhill Championship on way to the tied-14 place this January.

"On this course, you have to be aggressive even when you choose a safely shot,'' was the leader's idea of doing well here.

From the host's point of view, bogey-free rounds of Mukesh and Shamim were very encouraging. Mukesh, who failed to make the `cut' last year and has only two titles on the Indian Tour this season, was understandably cautious and had just one birdie on the front nine. But on his way in, Mukesh birdied thrice in a row before signing off with another one.

Shamim began from the first tee and straightaway birdied twice in succession. His other birdies came on the eighth, 15th and 18th holes.

The scores:

First round (Indian unless specified): Keith Horne (RSA) 63; Thaworn Wiratchant (Tha) 66; Mukesh Kumar, Clay Devers (US) and Shamim Khan 67; Yeh Chang-ting (Tpe), Mardan Mamat (Sin), Mo Joong-Kyung (Kor), Amritinder Singh, Gary Rusnak (US) and Bryan Saltus (US) 68; Rafiq Ali, Stephen Lindskog (Swe), Ross Bain (Sco), Scott Taylor (US), Hendrik Buhrmann (RSA), Pablo Del Olmo (Mex), Craig Kamps (RSA) and David Gleeson (Aus) 69; Gaurav Ghei, S.S.P. Chowrasia, Eiji Mozoguchi (Jpn), Rick Gibson (Can), Jason Dawes (Aus), Chris Williams (RSA), Danny Chia (Mal), Greg Hanrahan (US) and Roop Singh 70; Suleman Ali, Ajay Gupta, Yusuf Ali, Sanjay Kumar, Kim Felton (Aus), Lam Chih Bing (Sin), Edward Loar (US), Uttam Singh Mundy, Vijay Kumar, Anthony Kang (US), Atthaphon Pra Manee (Tha), Paul Spargo (Aus), Jammnian Chitprasong (Tha), Mike Cunning (US), Boochu Ruangkit (Tha), Amit Dube and Davender Patel 71.

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