Last Update: March 01, 2023, 22:38 IST
Ahmedabad’s Anshul Patel and Patna’s Aman Raj carded six-under 66s in the first round of the Rs 1 crore Gujarat Open Golf Championship to finish joint-top here on Wednesday.
Rookie Makoto Iwasaki (68) of Japan was one shot behind the leaders in third place.
Playing on his home course, Anshul, who started the year with a top-10 finish at the qualifying school to reclaim his PGTI card, got off to a fine start with five shots on the back-nine.
He made two long conversions and got to within four feet for an eagle on the par-5 14th at Kalahar Blues & Greens Golf Club.
The 27-year-old then hit it out of bounds on the third, which resulted in a double bogey for him. However, he more than made up for the error on the third by adding three more birdies to his card.
PGTI winner Aman suffered early setbacks as he bogeyed the second and third holes. He then carded eight birdies including three birdies in the last three holes. He converted five from 10 to 15 feet range.
Another local professional Varun Parikh shot 70 to finish tied ninth with Khalin Joshi.
Prominent names include Viraj Madappa (73) tied-33rd, Yuvraj Singh Sandhu (74) tied-45th and Udayan Mane (76) tied-72nd.
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)