DORNOCH MAN HAS LOST HIS FORM ON WEB.COM TOUR
GUNN MISFIRES WITH A 76 IN CHILE
Jimmy Gunn from Dornoch has not made a good start to the Web.com Tour event - the Chile Classic, at the Price of Wales Country Club, Santiago.
Gunn, one of the early starters when conditions were reckoned to be easier than those for later in the day when a wind got up, returned a four-over-par 76, which was 12 strokes off the lead in jt 130th place in a field of 144 at the end of the day.
The Highland exile, who now lives at Scottsdale, Arizona, came to grief early in the round.
He had a double bogey 7 at the long third followed by a bogey 4 at the short fourth.
He got what was to prove to be his only birdie, a 4 at the long ninth.
But Gunn frittered away two more shots to par with bogeys at the 12th and 16th.
The odds are long against him beating the halfway cut.
THREE SHARE LEAD WITH 64s
FROM THE US PGA TOUR WEBSITE
• The course record at the Prince of Wales Country Club is 11-under 61, set by 2013 tournament champion Kevin Kisner in the third round a year ago.
FIRST-ROUND LEADERS
Par 72
64 Garth Mulroy (S Africa), Sebastian Vazquez (Mexico), Henrik Norlander (Sweden)
65 Byron Smith (USA)
66 Jorge Fernandez Valdes (Argentina), Roger Sloan (Canada)
SELECTED SCORE
76 Jimmy Gunn (Scotland) (T130)
Field of 144 players
TO VIEW ALL THE SCORES
CLICK HERE
Jimmy Gunn from Dornoch has not made a good start to the Web.com Tour event - the Chile Classic, at the Price of Wales Country Club, Santiago.
Gunn, one of the early starters when conditions were reckoned to be easier than those for later in the day when a wind got up, returned a four-over-par 76, which was 12 strokes off the lead in jt 130th place in a field of 144 at the end of the day.
The Highland exile, who now lives at Scottsdale, Arizona, came to grief early in the round.
He had a double bogey 7 at the long third followed by a bogey 4 at the short fourth.
He got what was to prove to be his only birdie, a 4 at the long ninth.
But Gunn frittered away two more shots to par with bogeys at the 12th and 16th.
The odds are long against him beating the halfway cut.
THREE SHARE LEAD WITH 64s
FROM THE US PGA TOUR WEBSITE
SANTIAGO, Chile – South Africa's Garth Mulroy, Mexico’s Sebastian
Vazquez and Sweden's Henrik Norlander all posted 8-under 64s and share
the first-round lead at the Chile Classic, the second stop on the 2014
Web.com Tour schedule.
Canada's Byron Smith's round of 65 is good for solo fourth at the Prince of Wales Country Club course in Santiago, while Jorge Fernandez-Valdes of Argentina and Roger Sloan, another Canadian, are tied for fifth place, two back of the leaders.
Nine more players are knotted at 5-under 67, including Andrew Putnam and Santiago native Nicolas Geyger. Carlos Sainz Jr., of Illinois was the only afternoon starter to join the group and that was courtesy of a late run that saw him birdie Nos. 6 and 7 and then double-eagle the par-5, 9th to close his day.
Fourteen of the top 15 posted scores came from the morning wave Thursday as afternoon winds picked up and made the already firm and fast layout a little tougher to handle.
“You don’t have to hit it far but you have to hit it straight,” said Mulroy, who saw the course for the first time on Tuesday.
“You have to put the tee shot in the fairway and in certain positions. I hit only four drivers all day and one of those was a bit of a gamble.”
The 64 is a nice start for the Mulroy, who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, but focused most of his time last year on the European Tour where he made 14 cuts in 17 starts and had a pair of top-10 finishes to wind up No. 51 on the Order of Merit.
“I played as few as I could in the States while still trying to get into the final four,” he said. “I didn’t play enough to get into those four and the ones I did play in, I didn’t play very well.
"A lot depends on these two weeks for me. If I play well here then I may shift my attention to this Tour this year.”
While Mulroy has a choice of which Tour he might use as an avenue back to the US PGA Tour in 2015, Vazquez and Norlander will use their rookie campaigns on this Tour as possible springboards.
Vazquez tied for 57th at last year’s Puerto Rico Open in his only career TOUR start while Norlander, a 2011 Augusta State grad, made 13 cuts in 22 starts on the TOUR as a rookie last year but wound up No. 159 on the FedExCup points list.
Vazquez, 23, started slowly and turned the front side in just one-under before hitting the accelerator on the back with a 7-under 29.
“I was hitting the ball well on the front nine but the putts didn’t go in,” he said. “I kept pretty calm and the second nine was very good.”
It was good because he stuffed his irons close – the longest of five birdie putts made was only 12 feet – and watched as his knock-down, 7-iron from under the trees at No. 17 eventually found the cup for an eagle-2.
“I pushed my first shot and was in between the trees,” he said. “I punched it under the branches from 112 yards. It was just a low one that isn’t supposed to go in. Sometimes you get some good luck.”
• Thursday weather: Mostly sunny all day. Winds were calm in the morning and then S 10-15 mph in the afternoon. High of 86.Canada's Byron Smith's round of 65 is good for solo fourth at the Prince of Wales Country Club course in Santiago, while Jorge Fernandez-Valdes of Argentina and Roger Sloan, another Canadian, are tied for fifth place, two back of the leaders.
Nine more players are knotted at 5-under 67, including Andrew Putnam and Santiago native Nicolas Geyger. Carlos Sainz Jr., of Illinois was the only afternoon starter to join the group and that was courtesy of a late run that saw him birdie Nos. 6 and 7 and then double-eagle the par-5, 9th to close his day.
Fourteen of the top 15 posted scores came from the morning wave Thursday as afternoon winds picked up and made the already firm and fast layout a little tougher to handle.
“You don’t have to hit it far but you have to hit it straight,” said Mulroy, who saw the course for the first time on Tuesday.
“You have to put the tee shot in the fairway and in certain positions. I hit only four drivers all day and one of those was a bit of a gamble.”
The 64 is a nice start for the Mulroy, who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, but focused most of his time last year on the European Tour where he made 14 cuts in 17 starts and had a pair of top-10 finishes to wind up No. 51 on the Order of Merit.
“I played as few as I could in the States while still trying to get into the final four,” he said. “I didn’t play enough to get into those four and the ones I did play in, I didn’t play very well.
"A lot depends on these two weeks for me. If I play well here then I may shift my attention to this Tour this year.”
While Mulroy has a choice of which Tour he might use as an avenue back to the US PGA Tour in 2015, Vazquez and Norlander will use their rookie campaigns on this Tour as possible springboards.
Vazquez tied for 57th at last year’s Puerto Rico Open in his only career TOUR start while Norlander, a 2011 Augusta State grad, made 13 cuts in 22 starts on the TOUR as a rookie last year but wound up No. 159 on the FedExCup points list.
Vazquez, 23, started slowly and turned the front side in just one-under before hitting the accelerator on the back with a 7-under 29.
“I was hitting the ball well on the front nine but the putts didn’t go in,” he said. “I kept pretty calm and the second nine was very good.”
It was good because he stuffed his irons close – the longest of five birdie putts made was only 12 feet – and watched as his knock-down, 7-iron from under the trees at No. 17 eventually found the cup for an eagle-2.
“I pushed my first shot and was in between the trees,” he said. “I punched it under the branches from 112 yards. It was just a low one that isn’t supposed to go in. Sometimes you get some good luck.”
• The course record at the Prince of Wales Country Club is 11-under 61, set by 2013 tournament champion Kevin Kisner in the third round a year ago.
FIRST-ROUND LEADERS
Par 72
64 Garth Mulroy (S Africa), Sebastian Vazquez (Mexico), Henrik Norlander (Sweden)
65 Byron Smith (USA)
66 Jorge Fernandez Valdes (Argentina), Roger Sloan (Canada)
SELECTED SCORE
76 Jimmy Gunn (Scotland) (T130)
Field of 144 players
TO VIEW ALL THE SCORES
CLICK HERE
Labels: NATIONWIDE TOUR
posted by Colin |
See story on its own page | Thursday, March 06, 2014
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home