Dec 06, 2019: Sweden’s Julia Engstrom moved a step closer to securing a maiden Ladies European Tour title after taking a six-stroke lead at halfway in the Magical Kenya Ladies Open presented by Safaricom’s M-Pesa. India’s promising players Tvesa Malik and Aditi Ashok sharing tied 8th place with french star Astrid Vayson.
Aditi carded two-under-70 and Tvesa carded one-under-71 respectively in the second round to align at 1-under-143 total and lying within top ten of the leaderboard at T8.
The 18-year-old Julia from Halmstad posted a six-under 66 on the Baobab Course at Vipingo Ridge, 30km north of Mombasa. She heads into the weekend on 11 under, ahead of Kelsey MacDonald, Ursula Wikstrom and Esther Henseleit, who are all looking for their first wins. Michele Thomson, Sanna Nuutinen and Cheyenne Woods and all a stroke further back and seven from the lead.
Teeing off from the 10th tee in the morning, Julia wasted little time in picking up from where she left off on Thursday, making birdies on four of her first five holes.
She made a solitary bogey on the par-4 16th for a back nine total of 33 and then played the front nine in 33, courtesy of birdies at the par-3 fourth, the par-5 sixth and the par-4 ninth.
“I didn’t hole that many putts in the middle of the round, but I finished off well. I played solid and hit more greens today, so I’m happy with my round,” said Engström, who ranks 40th on the LET order of merit and fifth in driving distance, with an average drive of 272 yards.
Ladies European Tour Release
