Lee-Anne Pace played herself into the weekend on Friday as she signed for a four-under-par 68 in the second round of the Ladies European Tour’s Comunidad De Madrid Ladies Open in Spain.
While she is not South Africa’s best-placed player in the tournament – Stacy Lee Bregman carded a two-under 70 to move to three-under and a share of 24th – Pace’s score was one of the better rounds of the day as she moved to two-under for the tournament and a share of 32nd. The tournament was led by Finland’s Tiia Koivisto on 10-under after she had a second round of six-under-par 66.
Three-time winner in the recently concluded Sunshine Ladies Tour season, Linn Grant of Sweden, shared second with Spanish amateur Cayetana Fernandez after Grant had a brilliant seven-under 65.
Koivisto, whose career best finishes on the LET are tied seventh in last year’s Aramco Team Series-Sotogrande and this year’s Investec South African Women’s Open respectively, used her seven-iron to hole-out for eagle on the second hole and added four more birdies on the fifth, 14th, 15th and 17th holes.
Grant, who has Swedish DJ ‘Kaaze’ acting as her caddie, carded eight birdies and a solitary bogey. She said: “I had a really good time with my caddie and got into a nice flow. I like the course and I hit my driver very well today. As long as you are on the fairways, you have a lot of chances to make birdies and I managed to roll some putts in. I think my last putt was probably the longest one. It was nine metres from off the green, so that’s really exciting, because you can see it going in all the way.”
This is her third LET tournament of the year and her first since South Africa. She added: “I’ve been home in Helsingborg, Sweden, seeing my coach, my family and friends, taking some time off and enjoying the Swedish spring.”
Bregman made three birdies and just one bogey in her round.
Making the cut on the number was Nobuhle Dlamini from eSwatini. She was on level-par after her second successive 72.
Behind her, Nicole Garcia missed the cut by one after a second-round 72. Also missing the weekend action was Lejan Lewthwaite who withdrew after her first-round 75.
