England’s Daniel Brooks grabbed a one-shot lead at the BMW SA Open in Johannesburg yesterday as the field completed a second round held over from Friday due to bad weather.
In all 78 players had to return to the course to finish their first 36 holes.
Brooks’ only previous European Tour title came at the 2014 Madeira Islands Open in a tournament which was reduced to just 36 holes because of the weather.
And he again showed he likes the going to be tough as he claimed six birdies in 11 holes upon the resumption to fire a 67 and move to nine under 135, one shot clear of South African Keith Horne who completed a 69 on Friday.
“It was quite breezy yesterday afternoon and I wasn’t playing that great as well, it was nice to come in for me for a bit of a rest, it was needed,” Brooks said.
“It’s going be a long day having played 11 holes this morning so I’ll just go out there and have some fun.
“Last year I got off to a really slow start and only started playing well halfway through the year so hopefully it’ll be the opposite way round this year.”
Branden Grace was a further shot back after a bogey-bogey finish in his resumed round alongside Jbe Kruger who completed a 70 on Friday as South African golfers dominated the leaderboard.
Grace had been impressive form on Friday and held a share of the lead when he resumed on the 12th at five under for his round.
He birdied the 14th to move ahead on his own, but bogeys on the 17th and 18th saw him drop back.
“I played some good golf and then didn’t get it going this morning,” he said.
“I made a couple of good putts and then let it slip on 15 with a three-putt on the par five and then just a couple of bad swings to follow that.”
Former US Open champion Retief Goosen was in the group on 140, but defending champion Andy Sullivan missed the cut with rounds of 75 and 72.
Also packing his bags was tournament host Ernie Els who fired rounds of 73-74.
Daniel Brooks
