Amateur Lowry leads dramatic Irish Open
BY Bruce Young | European PGA Tour | 2009 Irish Open | Round Two | 16 May 2009
The 3 Irish Open appears to have unearthed a future star of the game with the 22-year-old amateur Shane Lowry recording a stunning second round of 62 to take a two shot lead over Jamie Donaldson and the resurgent Robert Rock.
One of four amateurs invited to play the event Lowry was shell shocked after the round.
“I don’t know what to think to be honest, he said after his round. I just tried to go out there and play the game I played yesterday, and I holed a lot more putts today. It’s like a dream, really, the way I putted.”
“It’s an unbelievable feeling to be leading by two shots over a field like this. I didn’t expect it coming into the tournament, but I expected to do well. It’s my best round by four or five shots, maybe six shots.”
“It’s hard not to think about winning. And for anyone that says, don’t look at the score boards, it’s hard not to look at the score boards out there. There’s not many of them and when you see your name up there, you obviously think you can win. I don’t know, I’m just going to go out and try to play golf at the weekend and see how it goes from there. If I won, it would open all new doors to me, but I’m just going to go out and try to play as best I can.”
Rock finished runner up at the Italian Open last week and continued that form with a round of 65 to share second position with Donaldson who finished 4th in a recent event in Portugal.
The talk of the day was the disqualification of first round leader Francesco Molinari and Northern Ireland’s Michael Hoey. Molinari put together a round of 73 to be reasonably well placed heading into the weekend before an indiscretion in his scorecard was discovered. The Italian had a double bogey at his 12th hole but it was recorded against the wrong hole so while the totals added up the card was incorrect.
Hoey carried 15 clubs for the first two rounds but it was not discovered until today. He put it down to the experimenting he had been doing with several clubs and indecision about exactly which combination he would carry this week. He said much of the responsibility was the caddie’s but accepted some of the blame himself.
It has not been a good event for the Australians although the previous winner at this venue Brett Rumford recorded a round of 66 to bounce back from an opening round of 73 to make the cut in 44th position. Marcus Fraser was one short further back and was the only other Australasian to make the cut.
Australian Amateur Champion Scott Arnold did well for a second round of 70 but was unable to recover form his opening round of 77 and missed the cut.
