BRANDT SNEDEKER shot a flawless six-birdie 64 to lead the 2012 British Open at 10-under in the morning while Adam Scott fought back majestically in the afternoon to trail by a single stroke.
After Scott’s inspiring 64 and lead in the first round he was four strokes behind the American before he even got to tee off.
There were a couple of dodgy iron shots early and a bogey on the third before the newly turned 32 year old slipped back into gear and topped his 3-under 67 second round with a fighting birdie on the last.
At 9-under Scott is three in front of a very determined looking Tiger Woods, who holed at from a greenside bunker for a birdie on the last and his second successive 67.
Dane Thorbjorn is alone in fourth 5-under while a clutch of big names share fifth on 4-under including Graeme McDowell, Paul Lawrie, Matt Kuchar, Jason Dufner and Thomas Aiken. Ernie Els was alone on 3-under with world No.1 Luke Donald on 2-under with Steve Stricker.
Greg Chalmers was the next best placed Aussie on 1-under while at even a reasonably happy Geoff Ogilvy finally made another British Open cut and with the volatile nature of the event doesn’t consider himself out of contention.
Also making the cut, which finally fell at 4-over, were John Senden (+1), Aaron Badddeley (+2) and Brenden Jones (+3),
Snedeker has had an amazing two opening rounds, having not recorded a single bogey or managing to find himself in any of the course’s 206 bunkers.
“To hit it in no bunkers around here, you have to get lucky,” Snedeker said. “I don’t expect that stat to hold over the weekend.”
2012 British Open Leaderboard
I hope Adam can get the job done. He’s been my favourite golfer for the last 10 years. All of Australia is pulling for him.
He changed his preparation for the majors this year and it seems to be working well. He has a top 10 at the US Masters, top 15 at US Open and now most certainly at the worst a top 5 at the British.
Good luck tomorrow Adam!