Dutchman takes charge as Bayron wavers

GEN. TRIAS, Cavite – Guido Van der Valk battled back from five down and moved two-up as Jay Bayron faded in windy condition at the finish after a scorching start, putting the Dutchman in the threshold of a breakthrough victory in the ICTSI Eagle Ridge Challenge at the Faldo course here yesterday.

Van der Valk hit three birdies against a bogey in the last five holes to card a 71 then watched Bayron fumble with three straight bogeys from No. 15 for a 76 in a flight behind, finding himself 18 holes away from finally ending a long quest for the elusive Philippine Golf Tour crown.

“My putting just clicked since it’s hard to get par and very easy to get a bogey here,” said the 38-year-old Manila-based native of Lelystad, the Netherlands, whose best crack at the PGT title was foiled by Tony Lascuña in a three-man playoff with Korean-American Micah Shin in Bacolod in 2016.

He actually came into the P2.5 million event brimming with confidence, having churned out a pair of third place finishes in The Country Club Invitational and the Solaire Philippine Open the last three weeks.

Now two ahead of Bayron with an even 216 aggregate, Van der Valk hopes to put it all together on a tough course that continues to bedevil the games of the rest of the surviving 40-man field in the kickoff leg of this year’s Philippine Golf Tour sponsored by ICTSI.

“The course is really difficult, it’s tight and windy,” said Van der Valk as he zeroed in on the top P450,000 purse in the 72-hole championship organized by Pilipinas Golf Tournaments, Inc.