Honey Baisoya holds four-shot lead heading into final round of J&K Open

Honey Baisoya put himself in a strong position to win his seventh PGTI title after the third round of 66 gave him a four-shot advantage going into the final round of the J&K Open.

The 25-year-old Baisoya has played error-free golf for the first three days of the tournament, not having dropped a single bogey.

Delhi’s Baisoya, who was struggling with his form for most of the season, is looking for a turnaround in fortune, and after super splendid three days at the scenic Royal Springs Golf Course, his total moved to 14-under 202 at the Rs. 40 lakh PGTI event.

Rookie Kartik Sharma produced the day’s lowest score of 65 to take a leap of 15 spots to tied second at 10-under 206.

Angad Cheema of Panchkula fired a 66 to gain ten spots and end the day in a share for second place along with Kartik and Ahmedabad’s Shravan Desai, who struck a 69 on Friday.

Honey Baisoya, whose last win came in 2018 said, I’ve not played well in a while so I was nervous from the start of this event. But I’ve been hitting my 2-iron well and that helped set up a lot of opportunities for me. I made 17 greens in regulation today and 16 each on the first two days.”

“My new putter has also helped my scoring. I missed the cut last week because of my poor putting so I’m glad that I changed my putter just a day prior to this week’s event.”

Delhi’s Rashid Khan, Bengaluru’s Khalin Joshi and Karnal’s Mani Ram were tied fifth place at nine-under 207.

Pune-based Olympian Udayan Mane and Gurugram’s Veer Ahlawat were a further stroke back in tied eighth position.

PGTI Order of Merit leader Karandeep Kochhar of Chandigarh and Delhi-based Kshitij Naveed Kaul were in a share of 13th place at six-under 210.

Bengaluru’s Chikkarangappa, the last winner at Royal Springs Golf Course, was tied 26th at two-under 214.

The 8-time Asian Tour champion Jyoti Randhawa finished his third-day campaign at the tied-37th position.