Jamshedpur - November 15, 2004
Amby Valley PGAI Tour leader Ashok Kumar warned up in style for the Tata
Open 2004, with a brilliant six-under 64 at the curtain raising pro-am played at the
par-70 Beldih and Golmuri Golf Courseshere today.
Ashok in quest for his fifth straight Amby Valley PGAI Tour title is the
top contender for the winner’s cheque at the Tata Opens. Earlier India’s
shooting star and Olympic silver medalist Rajyavardhan Rathore inaugurated the event in
the august company of the man behind the event, B Muthuraman, Managing Director - Tata
Steel.
After an enthralling day’s play top honours went to the team led by
former All-India amateur champion Harinder Gupta. Harinder fired a one-under 69 and at 37
points led his team of Farzan Heerje, Sanjay Verma and A Mohanty to the title at a tally
of 111 points. The prizes were given away jointly by B Muthuraman and Rajyavardhan Rathore
at a prize distribution ceremony held later in the evening. The tournament was played on a
Team Stableford format where the two best net scores out of the three amateurs plus the
professional’s score which was mandatory counted towards the team score.Ashok was
once again in the limelight as his team of B Muthuraman, Ryan D’Costa and Harish
Pathak finished second at 109 points. Tour veteran Rohtas Singh and his team of Sandeep
Adesara, MK Jha and Sanjeev Paul finished third at 105 points. Harinder as the pro in the
winning team followed by Ashok and Rohtas. While Ashok earned an additional sum for
returning the ‘Best Individual Round by a Professional’ at 40 points, DS
Raghuvanshi and Vinod Kumar who tied at 38 points for finishing second in that category.
The ‘Best Amateur Individual Round’ was carded by Umang
Jhunjhunwala who beat Rajinder Sachdev to the post on a count-back after the two finished
tied at 40 points apiece. Among the professionals participating in the pro-am were the
likes of current Order of Merit leader and winner of four events this season, Ashok Kumar;
thrice Order of Merit winner, Mukesh Kumar; Rookie golfer and winner of the Amby
Valley-MGC Open 2004 (Chennai), Shiv Kapur; 2002 Indian Open winner, Vijay Kumar; twice
Honda Siel PGA Championship winner, Uttam Singh Mundy; twice Indian open winner (’91
& ’93) Ali Sher; Asian PGA Tour stars Indarjit Bhalotia and Gurbaaz Mann and
winner of over 100 professional titles in a career spanning over 35 years, Rohtas Singh
among others.
Back |
