Julien Sale and Adam Andersson both carded six under par opening rounds of 65 to share a one-stroke lead on the opening day of the Indoor Golf Group Challenge at Landeryds Golfklubb – Vesterby Links.
Starting at the tenth, Frenchman Sale opened with a pair of birdies and added two more at the seventeenth and eighteenth alongside a solitary bogey at thirteen to make the turn at three under. Further gains followed at the first, second and eighth holes to take him to six under par for his opening round.
The 26-year-old was delighted with his low-scoring day and particularly pleased to pick up early momentum after a fast start.
“I’m really happy with my performance today,” he said. “It’s always nice to shoot under par, and six under is a really nice score.
“It was really nice to start birdie-birdie. It gives you confidence and lately I’ve needed it because I’ve been playing pretty well but the scores haven’t really been there, so going under par rather quickly was really nice to get momentum and keep it going for the rest of the round.”
Sale highlighted the difficulty of negotiating the firm greens and large run-off areas at Vesterby Links and felt his lag putting was the key to keeping big numbers off the scorecard.
“The course this week is pretty tough,” he added. “It’s been playing quite firm and if you miss the green complexes, it’s not an easy up and down. The rain definitely helped a little bit today because the greens were a bit softer, so it was a touch easier to stop the ball on the greens.
“My lag putting was good. I missed a couple of greens and ended up putting from off the green, but I had a good pace, leaving myself a decent chance at pars, and when I hit the greens and was pretty far from [the hole], I always had an easy two putt.”
Sweden’s Andersson, who is making just his second Challenge Tour start this week, joined Sale at the top of the leaderboard after matching his score in wet and windy afternoon conditions which he feels are well-suited to his game.
“Today was very good,” he said. “I was quite focused, struck the ball well and made a few longer putts. I knew I needed to play well, but I didn’t have many expectations and just tried to focus on the next shot.
“I like this weather; I had two wins last year on the Nordic Golf League and both were in similar weather conditions, so I’m hoping for more of the same.”
Frenchman Pierre Pineau sits in third at five under par, one shot ahead of Dutchman Wil Besseling, Northern Irishman Jonathan Caldwell, and Swedes Tobias Jonsson and Mikael Lindberg in fourth. Seven players share eighth at three under par, including Sweden’s Joakim Lagergren, Englishman George Bloor and Spanish amateur Javier Barcos Garbayo.
The second round of the Indoor Golf Group Challenge gets under way at 7:30am local time, with Sale teeing it up alongside Swede Viktor Nordwall and Germany’s Allen John at 2:10pm.
