Durban — He relinquished the lead briefly on Friday, but JC Ritchie finished the second round of the Sunshine Tour’s Jonsson Workwear Open with a second successive nine-under-par score to move to 18-under at the halfway mark and a six-stroke lead.
The tournament, co-sanctioned by the Challenge Tour, has been played over two courses, The Woods at Mount Edgecombe and Durban Country Club, and the final two rounds will be decided at Durban Country Club.
After his pyrotechnics of the first round at The Woods at Mount Edgecombe, which included a hole-in-one on the second hole, Ritchie started sedately by his standards at Durban Country Club with a three-under 33 for his opening nine which began on the 10th hole.
Jbe’ Kruger, in the meantime, playing in the same group as Ritchie, raced through that opening nine in seven-under-par 29, and when he made his seventh birdie on the 18th, he pulled one ahead of Ritchie.
It was a lead that was to last just two holes, as Kruger was unable to improve his score at all on the homeward nine. Ritchie, however, struck with an eagle three at the third to draw ahead again. He added two shots to that margin over Kruger with birdies on six and seven. Then, as if in validation of his own estimation that he has never been striking the ball as well, he made another eagle-three on the eighth, sinking a 30-footer to show that his putting is not half bad at the moment either.
Ritchie came home in 30, and now the winner of the Bain’s Whisky Cape Town Open last week has the weekend to look forward to at Durban Country Club with a six-stroke cushion between him and the chasing pack. In fact, after Germany’s Christopher Mivis and Sweden’s Adam Blomme on 11-under in a share of third behind Ritchie and Kruger, there is another two-stroke gap to the next players. Rupert Kaminski of South Africa and Northern Ireland’s Tom McKibbin share fifth on nine-under.
SA Tour Golf