Rowan Lester is safely through to the final round of the Sunshine Tour’s Sunbet Challenge after following his opening 69 with a level-par 72 at Wingate Park Country Club.
After consecutive T14 and T20 finishes, the Hermitage man has found his feet in his maiden campaign on the Sunshine Tour, but he’ll be a little disappointed not to be much closer to the lead.
Starting round two on the back nine, Lester birdied the par-4 12th and par-5 15th and 18th holes to reach the turn at -3 for the day and inside the early top 10 at -6. But a double bogey on the first and another dropped shot on the third saw him finish on the number that he started the day.
Still, it was enough to earn him a tee time in Friday’s final round, where he’ll start nine shots behind the leader in a share of 40th place.
Unfortunately, Liam Grehan won’t be joining him. Needing to make up ground after a level-par opening round, the Mullingra native found himself with too much ground to make up after a poor start to round two and he finished well off the pace at +6.
This means that Lester, who came into the week ranked 54th in the Order of Merit, will likley overtake Grehan who was one place ahead of him in 53rd.
South African Jean-Paul Strydom leads the way at -12 after back-to-back rounds of 66, with fellow countrymen Gerhard Pepler, James Mack and Australian Austin Bautista sharing second, two shots further back.
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