David Carey and Jonathan Yates’ hopes of scaling the Alps Tour mountain all the way to the Challenge Tour took a hit on moving day with the pair failing to make ground on the field in Italy.
As the Grand Final of the Alps Tour changed course for the third round, heading to the Terre dei Consoli Golf Club, there was plenty of movement at the top of the leaderboard but Carey (73) and Yates (72) made no impact on proceedings.
Castleknock’s Carey now finds himself trailing five shots back ahead of the final round in a tie for 8th place at minus-five with the Dubliner likely needing a top-3 finish to force his way into the top-5 spots on the Order of Merit to achieve Challenge Tour graduation.
Naas pro Yates faces an even stiffer task and at nine shots back at minus-one, his hopes of a last-ditch ascent up the money-list mountain look forlorn ahead of Saturday’s last day in Italy.
That’s not the case for Frédéric Lacroix from France and Lucas Nemecz from Austria who both came in with -5 (67) for the day to put them in joint first place at -10 over 54 holes.
The weather was smiling again on the tournament with blue skies and sunshine as the two leaders teed off together. Lucas Nemecz carded 5 birdies and not a single bogey:
“The course is in great condition, fairways and greens. We both played well but I didn’t putt so well today. But this last event of the season is fun and a good fight.”
Frédéric Lacroix had two bogeys on his card today but remained focussed to come in with 7 birdies. He felt the course was maybe more suited to his game than that of the Golf Nazionale in the previous two rounds:
“This course plays much longer off the tee with wider fairways allowing for longer shots. You have to hit much bigger shots to get into trouble, although when you do it’s real big trouble!”
For Carey and Yates, hope is a powerful thing and they’ll be hoping something special remains in the locker ahead of a final assault at the Alps Tour 2019 Grand Final.
Full scoring HERE
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