Weather gods smile on Power after flooding hits Lahinch
MARK POWER followed one of his best rounds of the season with one of his worst but ended up topping the qualifiers after the second round of the South of Ireland Amateur Open was abandoned due to f looding.
The Kilkenny star (18) followed an opening 65 with a 79 as 30mph winds and rain squalls lashed the field in the Pierse Motors Volkswagen-sponsored event at Lahinch.
But Power’s disappointment turned to smiles a few hours later when the rain became torrential, f looding several greens, and with the round abandoned, he edged out Hilton Templepatrick’s Reece Black for the honour by virtue of his scores over the last three holes.
Play was suspended at 3.40pm and with only 72 of the 150-strong field managing to finish, the Championship committee decided to abandon the second day, declaring the leading 64 players from Wednesday’s first round the qualifiers for today’s matchplay stages.
“We have abandoned play due to the course being unplayable,” said Pádraig McInerney, chairman of the Championship Committee.
“With no guarantee of finishing today or even early tomorrow morning, Rule 33-2D [Course Unplayable] is being invoked.
“The options were to see how many had finished today’s round and with only 48pc of rounds completed, there was no likelihood of getting others around today or at a reasonable time tomorrow.
“We also had to look at weather conditions for tomorrow and it was felt that we would have a struggle tomorrow as well and it was best to abandon play completely from today and go with the top 64 scores from round one.
“We couldn’t be sure we would restart today or whether we would be finished at a reasonable time tomorrow. The hole on the eighth green and two others were completely under water.”
Just four of the 13 players who shot two-over 74s made the 64 qualifiers but champion James Sugrue, who played just four holes, felt the correct decision was made.
“The third and fourth greens were f looded and James Fox told me there was a river flowing past the hole on the seventh,” said Sugrue. “Hopefully, we will have a clear run at it tomorrow.”
Meanwhile, Irish duo Robin Dawson and Conor Purcell helped Great Britain and Ireland open up a 7-5 lead over the Continent of Europe in the St Andrews Trophy at Linna Golf in Finland.
Dawson defeated German Marc Hammer on the last while Purcell enjoyed a 4&3 win over Edgar Catherine of France.
Elsewhere, Olivia Mehaffey remains in the mix at the European Ladies’ Amateur Championship in Slovakia after carding a one-underpar 71 to sit six strokes off the lead.