HARTBEESPOORT, North West – Daniel van Tonder holds a two-stroke clubhouse lead going into the weekend of the MyGolfLife Open hosted by Pecanwood and is hunting back-to-back victories on the Sunshine Tour and HotelPlanner Tour.
Van Tonder signed for a second round of 66 on Friday to climb to 16 under par overall. His nearest challenger is Martin Vorster who posted a second round of 65 for a total of 14 under par.
But the second round will have to be completed on Saturday morning after play was suspended for a little under two hours due to dangerous weather conditions from an approaching storm.
Van Tonder is coming off a win in last week’s SDC Open and kept his hold on this tournament on another low-scoring day.
Van Tonder, who led the first round with a 62, teed off the first and did most of his scoring around the turn with a run of seven birdies in 10 holes and only one bogey in that stretch.
“I’m very pleased. I played solid. I didn’t really think about how to follow up my 62 yesterday. I took it as a new day to start fresh. But I did feel like I left a few birdies out there, especially on the front nine,” he said.
“You need to keep making birdies here. I’m looking forward to a bit of pressure. I play better when I’m under pressure. My gameplan on the weekend will be the same – head down and attack.”
Behind him, Vorster is also looking forward to a weekend of being in contention after his top-20 finish last week.
“I’m in a great position and excited for the weekend. Everything stays the same for the next two days and then we’ll add up the score at the end,” he said.
Vorster managed his game exceptionally well on Friday on a course where the temptation could be to try and force the birdies.
“It’s easy to get too aggressive on a course like this. You’re tempted to go for every flag, but sometimes taking a wedge and aiming just three steps left or right of the flag is the right shot. You know the scores are going to be really low here, so you need to remind yourself that if you give yourself chances the putts are going to drop. I just stuck to my gameplan very well today,” he said as he chases a maiden professional title.
With the scores as low as they are, the weekend still offers plenty of opportunity for those chasing Van Tonder, including Sebastian Friedrichsen and Nikhil Rama four shots behind him. – Michael Vlismas
