Jeremy Paul of Germany, Kris Ventura of Norway, and Harry Hall of England shared the lead at 7-under 64 on Thursday at the Mexico Open at Vidanta World, continuing the trend of having international winners at 6 of the 7 PGA TOUR events this year.
At Vidanta Vallarta, Hall played early and managed the wind, driving the green on the 297-yard 7th hole for another eagle shot and chipped in from 30 yards for eagle on the par-5 6th hole. He finished with 2 more pars after making a putt for birdie.
Late in the afternoon, the wind eased a little, which was advantageous for Ventura and Paul, whose twin brother Yannik is a rider on the DP World Tour. On a day when 70 players out of 132 in the field cracked 70, however, it came down to scoring birdies.
At the end of his round, Ventura made 3 consecutive birdies to go to 8-under, but he missed the green on his final hole, the par-3 ninth, chipped to 10 feet, and missed the par putt.
“Really solid aside from the last hole, which was a bummer. Obviously, I could have made a few more birdies, but I’m content with my current skill level. I can’t hope to smash it this hard every day. It was just one of those days when everything went just as planned.” Ventura said.
On the par-5 12th hole, Paul had two eagles: one on the reachable seventh hole and the other when he tore a 3-wood from 309 yards to roughly 12 feet.
“The wind must have helped it reach all the way up there, which was a great bonus. I hit a pretty good 3 wood, but I didn’t believe I could quite get there; I felt it was going to be just short of the green.” Paul said.
Before deciding to play the fairway left of the par-5 18th hole for a better angle, he had an opportunity to seize the lead. However, Paul was unaware that water was in play behind the green, and his 3-wood failed to cut back to the right towards the green. To save par, he hit a pitch from 50 yards to 6 feet after discovering the water.
They were 1 shot ahead of 5 players. Stephan Jaeger, who had 6 under through 11 holes and played the 3 par 5s on the back 9 at 1 over, was 2 shots behind and had good reason to be frustrated. He went into the water on the 18th hole for a bogey.
Georgia native Harris English won the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines in late January, making him the only American winner on the TOUR this year. With champions from Japan, Canada, Austria, Northern Ireland, Belgium, and Sweden, the TOUR has otherwise had a global flavour.
The Mexico Open at VidantaWorld has a lot of movement and low scoring, so there’s still a long way to go. Jake Knapp, the reigning winner, turned a mediocre round into a 67 by birdieing three of his final five holes. Aaron Rai of England, the top-ranked player in the field at No. 29, was also at 67.
