Louis de Jager shot his second successive 68 on Friday to lead the Suncoast Classic after the second round on the par-72 6,157-metre Durban Country Club.

The 22-year-old has yet to win on the Sunshine Tour, and had a share of the lead going into the final round just once before in the 2008 Seekers Classic Pro-Am.

That tournament remains his best tour performance, with his share of third. So far in 2009, his best tournament was the Telkom PGA Championship in February, when he tied for sixth behind winner Jaco van Zyl.

“I played really well on my opening nine,” he said. “It was flawless and I didn’t make a bogey. I hit the ball well, and putted nicely.

“On the back nine, I started hitting a few bad shots, but there are some tough holes out there. But my play was acceptable,” he added.

As the wind came up in the afternoon, play did become a little more difficult, and only De Jager of the late starters managed to threaten the early leaders.

Most impressive of those was Ryan Cairns: The Zimbabwean took a break from golf during the quiet period on the tour, and it paid dividends.

He shot a bogey-free round of eight-under-par 64, and, in an object lesson to many around him, he left his driver in the bag.

“Every time I stood on a tee and thought about using my driver, I took out a three-iron or a rescue club,” he said. “I just kept the heart rate down a bit.”

The conservative approach gave him the best round of the day, two shots better than Jean Hugo’s 66: That six-under lifted him into a share of second with Cairns, but he lamented his own conservative approach: “I should have attacked more instead of laying up,” he said.

He also battled with an inability to sink some makeable putts: “I made some decent length ones, but the shorter ones, I kept missing,” he said.

“It’s been a long time coming,” said Cairns of his round. “I took some time off for the first time since I turned pro in nearly three years.

“I took three weeks off just to refresh myself, and I came back and I started sinking putts. I had been missing putts for about nine months,” he said.

Cairns and Hugo were a single stroke ahead of Chris Swanepoel who went one-under for the day, and Jaco van Zyl, whose five-under 67 included an eagle three on the 468-metre par five third. Like Cairns and Hugo, Van Zyl also managed to go around without dropping a shot.

Overnight leader TC Charamba from Zimbabwe slipped from his first-round seven-under 65 to two-over in the second round, with a bogey six on the ninth and a double-bogey six on the ninth chiefly responsible for his slide down the leaderboard to a share of sixth.

With him were Titch Moore and Teboho Sefatsa on five-under.


RSS
Digg
de.li.cious
facebook
LATEST FEATURES
Celtic face Arsenal test (c) backpagepix Celtic will have to beat Arsenal if they want to qualify for Champions League group stages.
Sport's Pick Six Barend Prins takes a closer look at the weekend's Ashes Test as well as the Tri-Nations.
England nab another one (c) AFP They have done it again! Yet another South African is set to make his debut for England tomorrow.