The Hindu : Sport / Golf : Chowrasia in lead with course record

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Friday, Apr 06, 2007
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Sport - Golf

Chowrasia in lead with course record

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: S. S. P. Chowrasia's search for his maiden title at the Delhi Golf Club began on the right note when he fired a record-equalling nine-under 63 and opened a four-stroke lead on the opening day of the Rs.60-lakh AIS Open golf tournament here on Thursday.

Chowrasia's bogey-free round matched the previous best efforts on this course from Myanmar's Zao Moe and Sri Lanka's Anura Rohana.

Mukesh's magic

Chowrasia's score became the talking point of the evening and put into shade Mukesh Kumar's hole-in-one on the 12th where the Mhow golfer unleashed a 5-iron for a memorable result. The ball covered 200 yards and eventually found the hole after rolling downhill for about 10 feet.

Chowrasia's nearest challengers are Gaurav Ghei and Vinod Kumar. Ghei, supported by Indian Cements for over 13 years, fired seven birdies and led for the better part of the day before Vinod joined him at 5-under following a bogey-free round. But the leaderboard looked different once Chowrasia signed his career-best card.

"I could not have expected to putt any better than I did today," said the ever-smiling Chowrasia after the afternoon winds played havoc with the scores of several professionals, including Shiv Kapur's who shot a 73.

Birdies galore

Chowrasia, the Indian Open runner-up, needed only 24 putts and reached 16 greens in regulation. He also had a hat-trick of birdies in each half.

Returning to competitive golf after a three-week lay-off, Chowrasia started from the 10th tee and missed an 8-foot birdie. He was also destined to miss another birdie opportunity on his final hole of the day from seven feet. But in between, Chowrasia did everything right and found nine birdies with his putts varying from six inches to 10 feet.

Jyoti Randhawa, one of the playing partners of Chowrasia on Thursday, returned a par score after three birdies and as many bogeys to share the 26th spot, with British Open qualifier Lam Chih Bing, among others.

The scores: S. S. P. Chowrasia 63, Gaurav Ghei and Vinod Kumar 67 each; Gurki Shergill, C. Muniyappa, Ashok Kumar, Craig McLean and Shiv Prakash 68 each; Shamim Khan, Mukesh Kumar, Amandeep Johl and Shaurya Singh 69 each; Vishal Singh, Ranjit Singh, Randhir Singh Ghotra, Mohammad Maqbool, Jaiveer Virk, Mohammad Nawab and Navtej Singh (A) 70 each.

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