Pádraig Harrington turned back the clock enroute to a four-under opening round at the DP World Tour’s Ras Al Khaimah Championship at Al Hamra Golf Club, and the Dubliner sits tied for fourth among the early starters.
His final nine holes on day two of the Hero Dubai Desert Classic featured a double bogey and two closing bogeys to miss the cut by a single shot, but there was more than enough in the other 33 holes played to suggest that the 53-year-old was still more than capable of mixing it with the younger stars of the circuit and he’s now given himself a strong platform to build upon heading into day two on the northern Gulf Emirate.
Starting on the back nine on day one, he got off to a steady start, registering four pars but relying on his short game as he got up-and-down from greenside bunkers on 10 and 11, and from the fairway short on 12. He found himself in the sand again on 14, but this time it was a par-5 and another excellent bunker shot set up his first birdie and he reeled off two more in succession, pouring in a 20-footer on the par-3 15th and firing a laser-like short iron to close range on 16.
Further chances came and went as birdie putts from inside 10 feet slid by on 17 and 18, but he made the turn at -3 for the day and set about tackling the more difficult opening nine.
After two pars to being the inward loop, two excellent shots saw him find the putting surface on the par-5 third and a good lag putt was enough to secure a fourth birdie and he got to -5 when a deft pitch and run at the short but tricky fifth hole settled at tap-in range.
His first real mistake came on the sixth when he found himself short-sided and with the green running away on one of the toughest holes on the course and he couldn’t convert from 20 feet for par, but closed out with three more pars to card a 68 that was better by only Alexander Bjørk and Ivan Cantero’s 67s, and Marcus Armitage’s incredible 63.
Conor Purcell and Tom McKibbin were also among the early starters and it is the Portmarnock DP World Tour rookie who’ll be much the happier having traded two birdies and two bogeys for a level-par 72.
He’ll be a little disappointed not to be a shot or two better off as he played the four par-5s in level-par, only birdieing the third and dropping a shot after a wayward tee shot on the 14th, but in his two previous starts this season he’s given himself a mountain to climb after round one so will fancy his chances of making the first cut of his maiden campaign.
McKibbin was highly fancied coming in after his T6 finish in Dubai and steady improvement in his three previous visits to Al Hamra, but he missed good birdie chances on each of his opening three holes and then three-putted the 13th. Having missed putts from four, six, 11 and 12 feet on the first four greens, he then holed a 35-footer for birdie on 14, but then dropped further shots back-to-back on 15 and 16 before clawing one back on the par-5 18th.
But his entire game was a little off key, and having found the water on approach to the par-5 third, the resulting double bogey dropped him back to +3 and he added another bogey on the seventh before signing for a disappointing four-over 76 that means he’ll need something in the mid-60s on Friday if he’s to avoid missing the cut.
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