By Rahul Banerji
Gaganjeet Bhullar’s beautifully struck hole-in-one on day two of the 2 million euro BMW International Open in Munich on Friday may have earned the Kapurthala golfer a swank sports car, but he will be far more focused on finishing the week strongly.
Bhullar’s 6-iron tee shot on the 197-yard par-3 17th hole, which earned him a euro 194,000 BMW M8 coupe, landed below the pin and rolled upwards and onwards, swerving slightly to the right before trickling into the cup.
It was Gaganjeet’s first ace on the European tour.
The golfer himself looked a little stunned at the feat — and the prospect of a spanking new BMW — before being congratulated by playing partners Bradley Dredge and Ricardo Gouviea.
The ace notwithstanding, Bhullar lost some steam on the opening three holes of his second nine, dropping shots on all of them after he had made the turn on 3-under par 33 thanks to two birdies, the ace and one bogey.
He was to steady his run thereafter to finish on 1-under 71 and 4-under 144 having picked up one further birdie.
Dropping back
Gaganjeet is currently T24, down 18 places from his day one standing and seven shots behind Germany’s Martin Kaymer who is on 11-under 133, two ahead of South Africa’s Christian Bezuidenhout.
Two-time Hero Indian Open winner Shiv Shankar Prasad Chawrasia too had a god day at the office, overcoming a poor first day with a 4-under 68 in his second round for a share of 33rd place. The Kolkata golfer had six birdies on the day against two dropped shots.
Both Bhullar and Chawrasia were projected to comfortably make the BMW International cut which was pegged at 2-under 142, though Shiv Kapur (77, 73) failed to come through.
Need for speed
After 13 starts on the European Tour this season, Bhullar is 175th in the Official Golf World Rankings and 77th in the Race to Dubai, while Chawrasia has an OGWR placing of 830 and 173rd spot in the order of merit.
Bhullar’s best show so far was a fifth place in the Kenya Open this March and T12 at the team GolfSixes Cascains event in Portugal earlier this month along with Chawrasia. He has missed only two cuts on the European Tour, in China and Belgium, though his last title came at the Fiji International last year.
For his part, Chawrasia has 12 Euro Tour starts with just four cuts. Individually, his best for the season was T18 at the Made in Denmark last month.
Also read: Thailand win GolfSixes in shootout; SSP, Gagan falter
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