GOLF NEWS - Jean-Paul Strydom carded a blemish-free nine-under-par 63 in the opening round of the Vodacom Origins of Golf at Stellenbosch Golf Club to take a two-stroke lead on Thursday.
It’s only the second tournament he’s playing this season – after last week’s event at Humewood – following a long layoff due to a wrist injury he sustained before his victory in last season’s Tour Championship at Serengeti.
As such, he admits, he doesn’t have lofty expectations in the Winelands this week.
“It’s good to be back,” he admitted, “I was out for six months after my win, so I’m not expecting too much. I played nicely in the pro-am; I had good company in JJ Senekal who is a member here so it’s always nice to watch him go around the course here. So, I took a couple of notes there. But I’m not expecting much. I’d been practising for about a month before Humewood. I was rusty in Port Elizabeth but I’m happy with the start here.”
Birdies on the third, fifth, eighth and ninth holes characterised his front nine and after turning in 32, Strydom continued the assault; making three birdies on the trot from the 12th to the 14th. He was not done, because he made further gains on the par-four 16th and 17th holes to sign for an untainted 63.
“It always helps when you don’t have the bogeys on the card,” he cheerfully said, “I was walking down the 18th after I hit a nice driver through the fairway and I was in a divot and I was thinking ‘oh my goodness, please don’t do anything funny’.”
