US Tour Qualifying School Stage 2 eliminators

Kirkpatrick, Knox slip out of reckoning but Michael Sim

lying joint 10th in Texas

Edinburgh-born David Kirkpatrick has all but written off his chances of making it to the United States PGA Tour Final Qualifying School after a disastrous second-round 76 in the Stage 2 eliminator at Hombre Golf Club in Panama City Beach, Florida.
Kirkpatrick, based at Lakeland, Florida for several years, had a double bogey 5 at the short 11th and then a triple bogey 7 at the 18th.
With a halfway total of five-over-par 147, Kirkpatrick is in joint 63rd position in a field of 77. Only the leading 20 players at the end of four rounds will earn a place at the Final Q School.
The standard is so high at these qualifying eliminators - American Geoffrey Sisk leads at 11-under-par 131 with scores of 69 and 62, that there would seem to be no way back for Kirkpatrick or, for that matter, Inverness-born Russell Knox who had a 75 for 151.

Knox, so successful on the Hooters Tour all year, had a triple bogey 7 - at a different hole - for the second day in a row.

David Skinns from Lincoln is on 142 at Hombnre Golf Club with a apir of 71s and is lying joint 33rd. He needs to improve 13 places over the last 36 holes at this venue.
Aberdeen-born Michael Sim, however, is sitting pretty in the Stage 2 event at Deerwood Golf Club, Kingswood in Texas. Brought up in Australia, Sim shot a second-round 68 with five birdies for a halfway total of 139 and he is lying joint 10th at a venue where there will be 21 qualifiers.

Sim, pictured above, whose career on the US Tour was halted by a lower back stress fracture, had birdies at four long holes - the first, seventh , 14th and 16th - and a birdie 2 at the short eighth. He had one bogey, at the 12th.

Leading the field at Deerwood Golf Club is Richard Johnson with 65 and 69 for 10 under par 134.

Now whether this is Richard Johnson the Welshman or Richard Johnson the Swede - both of whom played on the US Tour in the season just ending - remains to be clarified.