JAKE CHASES HOT WARREN

GEORGE: Jake Redman made a tur naround from last year’s 81 at the Links, Fancourt, shooting a 68 yesterday and taking an early share of second place in round two of the Dimension Data Pro-am.

Redman, who plays out of Fancourt, took advantage of beautiful weather and by the end of the first half of the R3.5 million tournament had moved to seven-under.

“We were lucky that the weather played to our advantage and the wind didn’t blow that much,” said Redman.

“I was good off the tee today and I made some good putts. My iron play was fairly accurate, so all round it was really good today, which I’m really pleased about.”

Redman, who carded a solid 70 at Outeniqua in the first round, had an eventful front nine.

At the first and the eighth he made birdies, but followed both with bogeys. A third birdie at the fifth was the anchor of his front stretch and he tur ned at one-under.

“Being a local here is a bit of an advantage, but you still have to go out there and play the golf and play the shots,” he said.

His knowledge of his home course helped and he concentrated on keeping it in play, which proved successful, because he made no further drops during the round.

Four birdies on the back nine secured Redman’s tally at seven-under, one stroke behind clubhouse leader Warren Abery.

For the second time in as many rounds, Abery’s first deviation from par was a bogey, but he once again shrugged off the drop and by the 15th had reached 10-under.

Abery pulled it into the water at 17, which led to a double-drop and he had to settle for one-under-par 72.

He ended the second round at eight-under for the tournament.

“I love this place. I played solidly and got it to 10-under-par with one more par-five coming home,” said Abery.

“Making double on 17 hurt a good round. I was concentrating really well and I just hit one truly bad shot.”

Redman’s knowledge of the course is his key to success as he takes on the Montagu course today.

“I find Montagu has some tricky holes and you have to pay some respect to a lot of the holes. We’ll take it from there,” said Redman.

“I’m feeling good about my game and we’ll see how it goes tomorrow.” – Sapa