Suradit claims first-round lead

Doha: The $2.5m International Series Qatar yesterday made its debut at the Doha Golf Club, with Thailand’s Suradit Yongcharoenchai capturing opening day's honours with a solid four-under-par 68.

Under windy conditions at the famed golf destination yesterday, the 22-year-old Suradit's closest contenders included Canadian Richard T. Lee, Sangmoon Bae from Korea and Thailand’s Phachara Khongwatmai who came in with 69s at three-under-par.

The brand new event, the third of the season on the Asian Tour and the second of the year’s International Series tournaments, also saw South Africans Charl Schwartzel and Darren Fichardt and Travis Smyth from Australia shooting 70s.  

A golfer in action on the opening day.

Australia’s John Lyras and Todd Sinnott, Andy Ogletree from the United States, Indian Jyoti Randhawa, Malaysian Ben Leong, Filipino Miguel Tabuena, Thailand’s Thaworn Wiratchant, Nitithorn Thippong and Gunn Charoenkul, and Saudi Arabian Saud Alsharif all carded 71s. Suradit finished late in the day, unlike the three trailing him in second who played in the morning, and took the outright lead with a birdie on his last hole, the par-four ninth, having started his round on the back.

The 24-year-old Thai, a winner once before on the Asian Tour at the 2019 Mercuries Taiwan Masters, made five birdies and dropped one shot.

In hot pursuit is Lee a two-time winner on the Asian Tour who came close to winning two International Series events last year in Singapore and Morocco before finishing runner up on both occasions.

“I made a few good long putts in my round and just kept it in play, windy conditions so you have to keep it in the fairways and get it on the green to have putts that can go in,” the Canadian told Asian Tour's official web site.

“I think I converted that pretty well even though I had two bogeys out there, I’m looking forward to tomorrows round.

It was an encouraging round, made up of five birdies and two bogeys, for Lee considering he had to retire from last week’s International Series Oman as he was feeling unwell.

“Yeah I’m feeling about 70% healthy again and hopefully the next three days I can hold up and play the round I played today,” he added.

Schwartzel, the 2011 Masters champion, was happy to make a good start considering the difficult conditions, which saw the wind reach gusts of 35 kilometres per hour.

“Yeah, I thought teeing off early we would get a little bit of benefit with the wind, but we didn’t, so spent most the day in pretty strong conditions and thought I played really well. You always feel like when you played well you always feel like you could have left a few out there but in these conditions two under will be good,” he said.

Qatar's Jaham Al Kuwari in action during first round. 

Smyth was equally as happy to come in under par while battling the breeze.

“I feel awesome, I was joking around saying it’s just another day back where I’m from, it’s super. super windy in Sydney,” said the Australian.

“I just embraced it and felt like I got some control of my golf ball so just tried to use the wind to my advantage and yeah everything kind of went my way. I hit a few loose shots and found my ball and was able to scramble for pars. I got a little lucky combined with some good golf, so I’m stoked.”

Asian Tour