December 10, 2013: Young Viraj Madappa hardly had any time to practice as he had rushed from Kolkata where he was a part of the winning team at the Asia Pacific Junior Championship. However, he displayed no signs of tiredness as he shot a brilliant round of 7-under to take the lead in the opening round of the strokeplay event of the Tata Steel 113th Amateur Golf Championship of India being played at the challenging Par-70 Bombay Presidency Golf Club here on Tuesday.
The Kolkata lad was leading by one shot from Jamshedpur’s Karan Taunk who made an eagle-birdie-birdie finish for a fine 64. Udayan Mane who shot a 67 and Manu Gandas who carded a 69, combined to lead India ‘A’ into the top position along with India ‘B’ comprising of Karan and Trishul Chinappa (72).
The final round of strokeplay event will be played on the morrow and the top 32 will advance into the match-play event to decide the winner of the 113th edition of the second oldest Open in the world.
Viraj who began from the 10th, took a while to get into the groove as he lost a shot on the par-4 12th but the lanky lad from Kolkata ensured that it the only mistake of the day. Making a birdie par-4 14th, he saved another shot on the par-5 16th before making back to back eagles on the 18th and the first. With consecutive birdies on the fifth and sixth, Viraj finally submitted a card of 7-under.
“I am happy to open the tournament with a good score,” said Viraj after the round. “The greens are really quick and I took some time to adjust to them. I hope to end up as the top seed,” added the leader.
Top scores after 18 holes
63 Viraj Madappa; 64 Karan Taunk; 67 Udayan Mane; 68 Dhruv Sheoran, Syed Saqib Ahmed, Aman Raj; 69 Manu Gandas: 70 Jaibir Singh, Vikram Rana; 71 Ankur Chadha, Shakti Singh
Team standings
136 India ‘A’ (Udayan Mane, Manu Gandas), India ‘B’ (Karan Taunk, Trishul Chinnappa); 140 India ‘C’ (Syed Saqib Ahmed, Samarth Dwivedi); 144 Bangladesh ‘A’ (Md. Mazim, Md. Sajib Ali)
