With play suspended for the day on Saturday, Luke Brown (photo: Tyrone Winfield) leads the second round of the Kit Kat Group ProAm after his superb seven-under-par 65 took him to 10-under for the tournament.
Jake Redman is also on 10-under, but he still has three holes to complete, and that will be done when the second round resumes at 7am on Sunday. Brown and Redman have a two-stroke lead over Callum Mowat who completed a 68 for his second round, and Malcolm Mitchell, who carded a two-under 70 to move to eight-under.
“I’m really happy with my round today,” said Brown, who won on the Big Easy IGT Challenge Tour back in January with a five-stroke victory at The Els Club Copperleaf. “That win was a while back, but it gave me a sense of what to expect when I get into that position again.”
He gave himself the best possible start to his second round – moving day, as players call the penultimate round as they jockey for position ahead of the final push – as he eagled the par-five first. “I hit a good driver off the tee, and it’s quite a short par-five,” he explained. “I had a wedge in and made the putt.”
He picked up birdies on five, seven and eight to reach the turn in five-under 32, and he picked up another shot immediately after the turn as he birdied 10. But he dropped a shot on 11 before making birdies on 16 and 18 to round out a good day.
“It was a question of not getting too aggressive today,” he said. “There were some really tucked pin positions, so it would not have paid to try and fire at them. It might get a little easier in the final round.”
With his experience from Copperleaf still relatively fresh in his memory, though, he’s unlikely to change the way he does things for the final round. “Obviously, you wait and see how things pan out early on in the round,” he said, “and then, if you have to, you start taking a few risks. I also might get a bit more aggressive on the par-fives, especially the sixth, which I think I should be able to reach in two.”
With the second round drawing to its close from 7am, the third round will feature a two-tee start from 8.45am.
