Barnes the man to chase at VIC PGA

BY Ewan Porter | Von Nida Tour | 2007 Victorian PGA Championship | Round Two | 26 Jan 2007

I got one prediction right this week and that was the low scoring that I forecasted. Kurt Barnes, known by the players as “Barnesy” shooting 66 & 62 to be -16, to be leading by 5 shots. It’s pretty amazing stuff and it’s good to see the big fella’s vegetable diet is paying dividends.

Sanctuary Lakes is definitely a course that ‘s right up Barnes’ alley. Wide, firm fairways will make him a very hard man to beat come Sunday evening.

The conditions have been very receptive to good scoring and yesterday morning I had the pleasure of being part of quite a remarkable feat. Whilst not meaning to blow my own trumpet, myself and playing partners Tristan Lambert and Jason Norris managed to shoot scores of 66,64 and 65 respectively.

The fact our little 10/10/10 side wager may have relaxed the mood for the day (you have to break the mood somehow) and on our second nine holes (the front 9 at Sanctuary Lakes) Jason and I shot 31 (-5) only to be dusted up two shots by Tristan; obviously he his on fire and now has a fatter wallet from the experience at my expense.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been playing a fair bit of golf with Tristan at home in Sydney and his game has improved dramatically recently and along with his relaxed attitude, I look forward to some big results from him in the coming tournaments.

One of my early tournament predictions of a player, who would rate was my good buddy and travel mate Aron Price. Aron unfortunately missed his first cut as a professional on Australian soil in two years, albeit by one stroke. I am wondering if this may have anything to do with the fact myself and James Nitties took him for his debut gym workout on Tuesday afternoon (the man is not known for this type of treatment) and had him waking up each morning complaining he couldn’t move. Or perhaps it was the pressure of the new sponsorship deal from the iseekgolf.com boys – we may never know!

Good to see so many good scores over the past two days as well from a variety of golfers.

Unheralded local amateur Daniel Popovic shot an outstanding 65 this morning that included a double on 17. Dean Kinney bounced back from a mediocre 73 with a brilliant second round 64. Steve Bowditch overcame a double bogey on his way to a 65. Lets not forget the new course record set by Big Barnesy; a 62.

There’s bound to be some excellent golf this weekend and a large gallery should gather to create an electric atmosphere. From a player’s perspective, mine in particular, crowd interaction is great. It definitely adds to the interest to the players, apart from those side bets.

My strategy this weekend?

I think from all the player’s perspective we are all going to have to go all out and attack at all costs, if we are to have a chance of getting near Kurt. So stay tuned for some low numbers and juicy inside scoops.