Sleepy Ittiphat snatches clubhouse lead

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Thailand’s Ittiphat Buranathanyarat took advantage of his short nap while waiting for play to begin by firing an opening round eight-under-par 64 to surge to the top of the leaderboard at the US$400,000 Panasonic Open India on Thursday.

The first round of the Panasonic Open India was delayed by slightly more than four hours due to weather and visibility conditions. Only players from the morning session managed to tee off with tournament organisers opting for a four-tee start to make up for the lost time.

Players from the afternoon session are scheduled to start their rounds at 11am (local time) on Friday morning at the Classic Golf and Country Club.

An energized Ittiphat shrugged off any weather concerns by opening with two consecutive birdies in his opening sixth and seventh holes. He then went on a five-hole birdie blitz starting from the par-four 13 before dropping his only shot of the day on the first hole.

The Thai responded quickly with an eagle-three on the third hole before two more birdies on holes six and seven soared him atop the leaderboard where he would eventually take a two-shot lead over Indonesia’s Danny Masrin.

Masrin, who is searching for his maiden Asian Tour victory this week, returned with a bogey-free 66 while in-form Shiv Kapur of India signed for a 67 for a share of third place with American Ben Geyer a further shot in tied-eighth place after he returned with a 68.

Leading Scores after round 1 of the Panasonic Open India 2019 being played at the par 72, 7114 Yards Classic Golf and Country Club course (am - denotes amateur):
64 - Itthipat Buranatanyarat (THA).
66 - Danny Masrin (INA).
67 - Arjun Prasad (IND), Shiv Kapur (IND), M. Dharma (IND), Hung Chien-yao (TPE), Shankar Das (IND).
68 - Ben Geyer (USA), Anura Rohana (SRI), Jesse Yap (SIN).
69 - Travis Smyth (AUS), Siddikur Rahman (BAN), Prom Meesawat (THA), N. Thangaraja (SRI), Tirawat Kaewsiribandit (THA), Viraj Madappa (IND), Aadil Bedi (IND), Miguel Tabuena (PHI), Arjun Atwal (IND).
70 - Shinichi Mizuno (JPN), Om Prakash Chouhan (IND), Pavit Tangkamolprasert (THA), Gaurav Pratap Singh (IND), Jeev Milkha Singh (IND), Jack Harrison (ENG).
71 - Yashas Chandra (IND), Namchok Tantipokhakul (THA), Himmat Rai (IND), Adam Blyth (AUS), Hyukchul Shin (KOR), Thitiphun Chuayprakong (THA), Badal Hossain (BAN).
72 - Raju Ali (IND), Mukesh Kumar (IND), Prabagaran K. (SRI), Harendra Gupta (IND), R. Marimuthu (IND), Jyoti Randhawa (IND), Mithun Perera (SRI), Amritinder Singh (IND), Amardip Malik (IND), Sunit Chowrasia (IND).