Mount Juliet Estate, Ireland: Today (Thursday), I shot a first round five-under par 67 in the $6 million Horizon Irish Open at Mount Juliet Estate, Ireland, set to run till Sunday (July 3) 2022, on the DP World Tour.
I was lying in 12th place when I signed my card in the scoring tent. It is always important to get off to a solid start in any tournament these days.
The standard is so high on the DP World Tour, they are all good players in the field that catching up and chasing targets to make the cut is very challenging.
As they say: ‘you cannot win the tournament in the first round, but you can certainly lose it.’
In my group, Aaron Rai (England) and Pablo Larrazabal (Spain) both shot 66’s and I shot a 67. Not a bad group for the crowds and ourselves: 17-under for our three-ball. Aaron even had two bogeys on his card.
I had an eagle and three birdies with nines of 33 and 34, which was more than satisfying, and no dropped shots.
The course was playing soft, and at 7,264 yards, it is not one of the longer courses we play all year and with receptive, very smooth running greens and hardly any breeze, it was always going to be a day of good scoring. To achieve good scores on Tour, the par 5’s are always the secret and I covered the four par 5’s in four under par. More of this please for the rest of the week.
Ryan Fox (NZ) who won earlier in the season at the Ras Al Khaimah Classic at Al Hamra Golf Club, UAE where I finished tied sixth, is on top of the leaderboard after a 64. What a year Ryan is having, he seems to be up there every single week.
My tee off time tomorrow is at 8.20 am off the 10th tee. The greens will be freshly cut and hopefully be even better with the morning start and, if the weather remains kind, the golf course could be there for the taking!
96 players are under-par when I checked on the laptop on finishing. It looks like it will be a very low cut tomorrow (Friday) night.
The 2022 Horizon Irish Open will be broadcast by Dubai TV at 5 pm (local UAE time) on Friday.
Speak to you all after round two. Keep the birdies coming and let’s keep the bogeys off the card!
- Adrian Meronk is a 29-year-old Dubai resident, born in Germany with Polish nationality and plays on the DP World Tour.
