Golf Roundup: Modest start for Aditi at Evian; Rough one for Atwal at Barracuda

At the Evian Championship, Aditi Ashok shot two-over 73 and was 69th, while Diksha Dagar had a nightmarish finish in her six-over 77. Meanwhile, Arjun Atwal was lying at 85th position after the opening day’s play of the Barracuda Championship.

Aditi Ashok seemed to be going fine at two-under through 12 holes with birdies on fourth and seventh holes, but she was derailed by a double bogey on Par-4 13th and then bogeys on 16th and 18th pushed her further back to 73. (File Photo)

Aditi Ashok made a modest start in the first round of the Evian Championship, while Diksha Dagar had a rough opening here.

Aditi shot two-over 73 and was 69th, while Diksha, making her maiden appearance in a Major, had a nightmarish finish in her six-over 77.

Aditi seemed to be going fine at two-under through 12 holes with birdies on fourth and seventh holes, but she was derailed by a double bogey on Par-4 13th and then bogeys on 16th and 18th pushed her further back to 73.

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Diksha, winner of South African Women’s Open, landed a birdie on second for a good start, but a triple on Par-4 seventh meant she was on back foot.

A string of pars saw her complete 11 holes in two-over. But then came a disastrous stretch. She bogeyed 12th and 14th but picked a birdie on 16th. On the closing holes she dropped another bogey on 17th and a double on 18th to go six-over.

Meanwhile, Paula Creamer moved into the lead shooting a bogey-free 7-under 64 Thursday in the first round. At the Evian Resort Golf Club, where she had a signature win as a teenager, the 32-year-old American moved one shot clear after making her seventh birdie on the par-5 18th.

Brittany Altomare, who earned a career-best runner-up finish in Evian in 2017, joined seven-time major winner Inbee Park and Jin Young Ko, the ANA Inspiration winner in April, at 6 under.

Top-ranked Sung Hyun Park had a bogey-free 5 under through 15 holes at the picturesque 6,527-yard (5,968-meter) course at Evian, on a hillside overlooking Lake Geneva.

Atwal has a poor start in the first round of the Barracuda Championship

Arjun Atwal was lying way down at 85th position with four holes still to go after the opening day’s play was suspended due to bad weather.

Atwal had two birdies against three bogeys here.

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Daniel Chopra was further down at 126th. He had one birdie, four bogeys and one double.

Barracuda Championship is the only PGA Tour event using a modified Stableford scoring system.

As per the modified Stableford format, players get eight points for albatross, five for eagle, two for birdie and zero for par, and subtracts a point for bogey and three for double bogey or worse.

Play was stopped at 5:10 p.m. because of lightning and then called off for the rest of the day.

Sweden’s David Lingmerth had nine birdies to take the lead with 18 points at Montreaux Golf and Country Club.

Lingmerth is 229th in the FedExCup standings with only two weeks left to get into the top 125 for the first Playoff event. He has missed four straight cuts including shooting 79-63 last week in Kentucky in the Barbasol Championship.

The winner gets a spot in the 2020 PGA Championship.