By Rahul Banerji
Rashid Khan and Karan Pratap Singh held the clubhouse lead on 4-under par 68 on a fog-hit opening day of the Rs 2 crore Kapil Dev Grant Thornton Invitational at the DLF Golf & Country Club on Wednesday.
The start was delayed by 105 minutes and as a result, only the morning wave of 66 players could finish the first round. The 60 from the afternoon session were still on the course when play was suspended due to fading light at 5:15 pm.
Play resumes at 7 am on Thursday, the PGTI said.
Delhi’s Rashid Khan was among the early movers on day one as he chipped in for birdie on the second hole and followed that up with a long birdie conversion on the fifth.
The two-time international winner dropped his only shot of the day on the sixth but rebounded with three more birdies thereafter including two from between 15 and 25 feet.
Rashid said later, “It was cold early in the morning so the late start in the warmer conditions benefited me. Due to the delay, there may be a long gap before I play my second round so have to keep the momentum going when I come back to play.
Solid drives
“My short game has been good of late and it came good once again today. I had not been finding the fairways in the last few events, but today I came up with some really good tee shots and found the fairways. Hitting accurate tee shots is very important on this course.”
Karan Pratap Singh, a winner on the PGTI this year, started from tee 10 and was level par till the hole three with three birdies and three bogeys.
Singh, playing at his home course, then landed his irons with pinpoint precision to set up as many as four birdie putts within a range of five feet.
“I got more time to practice my putting today with the delayed start,” Singh said.
“That really helped on the course as I made a lot of good putts. I had the advantage of local knowledge as I play here daily. I landed the ball in the perfect spots to find the greens.”
Amardeep Malik and Kapil Kumar were tied for second in the clubhouse with scores of 70.
Among the players yet to finish round one, Rahil Gangjee and Shaurya Binu were looking good as they were four-under and three-under respectively through nine holes.
Reigning champion Varun Parikh began his week with a 6-over 78.
Also read: Edition two of Kapil Dev-Grant Thornton Invitational set for tee-off
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