Scot well placed to advance from Stage 2 Arizona event

MARTIN LAIRD SET TO QUALIFY

FOR US FINAL Q SCHOOL

 

Former Scottish youths golf champion Martin Laird from Glasgow is heading for the United States PGA Tour Final Qualifying School - if he avoids any last-round disasters in one of six Stage 2 events nationwide.

Laird, a former American college circuit player while on a four-year golf scholarship at Colorado University, has already come through Stage 1, finishing joint 11th in San Juan Oaks GC, Hollister, California in early November.

Having moved on to Southern Dunes Golf Club, Maricopa in Arizona, Laird has shot 70, 66 and 67 to be on 13-under-par 203 and lying second to American Mike Heinen on 200 (67-67-66).

The top 20 and ties from each of the six venues will qualify for the Final Q School over six rounds at La Quinta, California from November 29 to December 4.

Another former Scottish youths champion, Joel Hendry from Elgin, but a resident of America for the past decade, failed to survive a Stage 1 test at Durham, North Carolina.

One Scot who is guaranteed a place on the US PGA Tour next year is Aberdeen-born "Australian," Michael Sim who finished 19th in the US Nationwide Tour - the No 2 pro circuit in the States. The top 20 were automatically exempt from the Tour School process and go straight forward to rub shoulders with Tiger Woods & Co next season.

Sim holds dual British and Australian citizenship. He was born in Aberdeen 22 years ago. The Sim family emigrated from the Granite City to Perth, Western Australia when Michael was only six. In 2004-2005 Sim was ranked the world's No 1 amateur - a position currently held by another Aberdonian, US amateur championship winner Richie Ramsay.