MANILA, Philippines — Sarut Vongchaisit of Thailand shot a four-under par 68 as he claimed the lead at the start of the Philippine Golf Championship presented by the Philippine Sports Commission as the first event of the Asian Tour kicked off Thursday, Feb. 5 at the East Course of the Wack Wack Golf and Country Club in Mandaluyong City.
Vongchaisit, who is shooting for his first Asian Tour title, started at the back nine as part of the morning group and produced three birdies - on 11, 13 and 18 - but struggled as strong winds made it tougher for participants in this event that offers a total prize purse of US$500,000 from the Asian Tour and the National Golf Association of the Philippines (NGAP), the sport’s governing body in the country.
The front nine saw Vongchaisit birdie on 1, 4 and 8, but he bogeyed on 3 and 6. Despite the struggles, he expressed satisfaction on his opening round score and kept his optimism as he looks forward to improving in the second round Friday.
“I’m feeling good. Just put on play all round and put in any bad shots (behind). Definitely tough out there, the wind, especially on the back nine (my back nine so it’s the front nine),” said Vongchaisit.
“Study the course a little bit. I know this course is going to be tight so a lot rescue off the tee… so I practice a lot on those, and mend irons. Took golf (off) for two weeks after the season, definitely missed golf during that break.”
“Goal this year (is to) win out here on Asian Tour and hopefully get a spot for LIV,” Vongchaisit added.
Tied for second to fourth spots are American Charles Porter and South Korea’s Jeunghun Wang and Wooyoung Cho, all a stroke behind with similar 69, while Chinese Taipei’s Hung Chien Yao and Wang Wei-Hsuan, Kevin Yuan and Travis Smyth of Australia, and American Marcus Plunkett share sixth to ninth places all with identical 70.
“I was hoping to try to get first because there’s a big prize for the first today,” said the towering 6-foot-9 Porter, who mixed his rounds with six birdies and three bogeys.
“I am happy with the score, however, I was playing really tough. I got to plot my way around this place. I’ve had a lot of drivers. I did that all day. Tried to stay patient and made a couple of nice birdies. The wind was tricky in the afternoon. Chipping out of the grass, that was really, really tricky. I think I’ll go try some chipping and try to figure it out,” said Porter.
Filipino golfers Keanu Jahns and Fidel Concepcion are tied for 10th to 21st spots with their 70 in this first Asian Tour event the country is hosting for the second straight year and is backed by the MVP Sports Foundation and Bingo Plus.
“It was very tough. You have to play very conservatively,” said Concepcion. “I think I might have hit like one or two drivers all day. I was pretty much laying up just in the fattest part of the fairway the whole day. I think the key here is you want to hit most of the fairways so you have full control of the ball.”
“And yeah, the greens, obviously they're always tricky. I think that's the biggest, that's sort of the biggest protection of the golf course, the biggest defense. So hitting greens isn't really that advantageous.”
“Sometimes it's a bit easier to sort of pitch from the short side of the park rather than have a 30-40 footer,” he added.
Also with 70 are Ekpharit Wu, Sarit Suwannarut, Poosit Supupramai, Tanapat Pichaikool and Rattanon Wannasrichan of Thailand, Ervin Chang of Malaysia, Shaurya Bhattacharya of India, Shunyat Hak of Hong Kong, Ahmad Baig of Pakistan and Chen Guxin of China. TMT