Mark Power and Gary Hurley share the lead of the tournament within a tournament as they battle for a place in next month’s Irish Open this weekend at Killeen Castle.
Both players share 28th place on four-under at the halfway point of the Irish Challenge and although they look out of contention for the championship title at eight shots adrift of Louis Albertse they are tied as the leading Irishmen as they look to punch a ticket to Doonbeg.
Power carded a level-par round of 72 while Hurley birdied two of his last four holes for a 70 as six of the eighteen Irish players made the cut.
Dermot McElroy, Liam Nolan and Max Kennedy all came from below the cut line to book their spots for the weekend on the cut mark at one-under with rounds of 71, 69 and 68 while Ronan Mullarney joined them after a 74. They are still in contention for the Christy O’Connor Jnr Trophy and a place in the Irish Open at three shots back of Power and Hurley.
At the top, Albertse fired a nine under par second round of 63 to take a two-stroke lead.
The South African, who started the day five shots back, mixed eight birdies with one eagle, dropping just one shot, to reach 12 under par for the week, two shots ahead of his compatriot Bryce Easton who holds solo second.
“It was lovely out there,” he said.
“I played great, I really did. Starting off with a bogey wasn’t great and moving to two under for the tournament you still have a lot of work to do but after that I really played nicely.”
After starting his round with a dropped shot on the tenth, Albertse responded well with back-to-back gains before adding another birdie on the par five 15th. The South African would then catch fire as he made the turn, rattling off five consecutive birdies from the 18th to reach seven under for the day with five holes to play.
Better was to come, however, as Albertse chipped in for eagle on the seventh to pull clear at the top. And the 28-year-old, after a difficult start, was delighted with how he bounced back.
“You have to try and breath when you drop a shot early,” he added.
“You still have 17 holes to play, and it can go either way. I think my birdie on 11 after the dropped shot was one of the better birdies of my round.
“18 was a world-class birdie, and I went onto make a couple more on the front nine which was great. Going into this week I knew this was a big golf course so I’m pretty proud of getting to nine under.”
Albertse currently sits 27th on the season-long Road to Mallorca Rankings and already has a runner-up finish to his name this term, coming at the Interwetten Open in June.
Despite giving himself a good chance of contending for promotion to the DP World Tour, he is looking to remain focussed with just a handful of events remaining before the Rolex Grand Final supported by The R&A.
“I’m not trying to think about the Rankings too much,” he said.
“There’s a lot of golf to go and points to be made. If you do think about it, you can fail to stay in the moment. We’re playing against world-class players week in and week out so staying to my processes it important.”
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