Warren Bennett, out of the game for most of last season through illness and injury, got himself back on the road to recovery with an eight under par 63 in the Caltex Singapore Masters at Singapore Island Country Club to share the first round lead with last week’s runner-up Padraig Harrington.
Bennett won five times on the European Challenge Tour in 1998 and then captured his maiden European Tour title with victory in the Scottish PGA Championship the following season. But just a couple of weeks after his winning breakthrough, the 29 year old was struck down with pneumonia. Weakened by his illness, Bennett was then laid low by a recurrence of a neck injury that had dogged his early career. He managed just six starts in 2000 before deciding to try to sort himself out once and for all.
“In the middle of last year I felt I might never play again,” he said. “It was just three years of pain. You end up not being yourself. It gets inside your mind. You can’t practice the way you would want to.”
Bennett sought the services of Harley Street specialist Anthony Jackabouski. Three times a week he was manipulated and massaged back into shape but for six months he didn’t touch a club.
“It was 50-50 whether I went under the knife or not. Quite close to an operation but he decided against it. I had some good people behind me, helping me. But it was a long road. Six months it took me without touching a club.
“Anthony got me through mentally as well as physically. He helped me a lot. I was low when I went to see him last year but he got me through it.”
Bennett now has to exercise every night, mainly strengthening his upper back but feels he is back to where he was before the injury and ready to carry on where he left off.
Out in 33 after two birdies, Bennett charged up the leaderboard with six birdies on the homeward stretch to draw level with Harrington, who moved into the top 20 in the World Ranking for the first time last week.
Harrington was defeated in a play-off by Vijay Singh in Malaysia on Sunday but the omens are good for the Irishman in Singapore. Last time he lost a play-off – in Brazil last year – he won the following week.
Like Bennett, Harrington also made a slow start, starting on the tenth and picking up an eagle on the 15th by chipping in from 45 feet. But he gave one shot back on the next hole, fluffing a simple chip of a similar distance to the previous hole. Out in 35 and turning his focus to damage limitation, Harrington suddenly found his range and rattled in seven birdies on the homeward stretch for a nine hole total of 28 and round of 63, equalling the European Tour low round for the Bukit Course set in 1993 but a shot outside the course record set by Dean Wilson in 1998.
“I’m very pleased with that,” said Harrington. “It was a very strange round. I was probably trying too hard on my front nine and after last week had a lot of expectations. I felt things weren’t going for me. I was getting down on myself. But then I relaxed a bit and compared to the front nine, the back nine was blissful. The front nine was hard work to shoot one under and the back nine easy to shoot seven under.
“I need to drive it better than I did today. I only hit three or four fairways and I won’t get away with that every day. But my irons were good and I holed the putts on the back nine.”
Masters champion Singh, the man who beat Harrington last week, was again on top form, celebrating his 38th birthday with a round of 64 to lie just one shot off the pace. The Fijian, a winner of nine European Tour titles, opened his door this morning to the sight of six people holding a birthday cake for him. But the surprise clearly spurred him on as he picked up five birdies and an eagle to move into a four-way share of third place alongside Anthony Wall, Maarten Lafeber and Frankie Minoza.
“It was a nice way to celebrate my birthday,” said Singh. “But I couldn’t get used to the speed of the greens. I didn’t leave any shots out there but did leave a few putts short.”
Wall, with a new caddie on the bag and putting with his left hand below right for the first time after deciding his arms were too long to putt conventionally, stroked home the birdie putts to move into the frame. Wall was another player laid low by illness having been struck down by two bouts of glandular fever last season after claiming his maiden title in South Africa.
“I felt as if I started the season three times last year,” said the 2000 Alfred Dunhill Champion. “I drove the ball exceptionally well today and that was the key. I hit almost every fairway.”
Lafeber, joint seventh in last week's Carlsberg Malaysian Open after leading after the first round, started strongly once again with his 64 while Minoza, winner at Singapore Island Country Club as both an amateur and professional, leads the Asian PGA Tour challenge in this co-sanctioned event after the first day.
Colin Montgomerie launched his 2001 European Tour campaign with a five under par 66 which included three birdies in the first four holes, an eagle on the 15th and no dropped shots.
"A good start," he said. "No dropped shots was important. I'm playing at a consistent level."
