Everything you need to know from day two at Fairmont St Andrews.
Matt Wallace reproduced his fine recent form to join first round leader Adrian Otaegui at the summit, while Aaron Rai was leaving his putter firmly in the bag on day two of the 2020 Scottish Championship presented by AXA.
Here is everything you need to know from day two at Fairmont St Andrews.
Rai's excellent eagles
Englishman Rai made the perfect start to his second round, holing his approach shot for an eagle at the par four first to get to eight under par. He went and did it again at the par five sixth, chipping in his third shot from the edge of a bunker. Rai set up yet another eagle chance when he sent his tee shot at the seventh to within 20 feet of the cup, but he had to settle for a tap-in birdie there. The Aberdeen Standard Investments Scottish Open champion heads into the weekend one shot behind the co-leaders after Friday's 67.
Waring explains all
Paul Waring caught our attention yesterday when he used a driver to chip out of the rough around the 11th green. Today, he explained his thinking. He said: "There was no other way of getting club on the ball. I had a massive tuft of fescue grass behind it so I would have had to full swing wedge to get through that but I couldn’t do that because of the gorse bush there. So I put driver right at the back of my stance and then actually hit the actual ball into the floor. Me and my caddie looked at it and he went ‘I actually like driver or three wood out of that’ and I’ve gone ‘well, driver because it’s got a bigger head!’."
To be fair I didn’t have a backswing because of the gorse and a massive clump of fescue rough behind the ball. I’ll show you that one one day! 😜 https://t.co/Q3mSy3NFRK
— Paul Waring (@PaulWaringGolf) October 15, 2020
Harding's birdie blitz
After finishing his first round with back to back birdies to banish the memory of the double bogey he made at the 12th, Justin Harding carried on making gains on Friday. Starting from the tenth tee, he mixed five birdies with two bogeys on his front nine before picking up five more shots down the stretch to sign for a 64 and head into the weekend on five under par.
Cameraman keeps his feet on the ground
Aside from Adrian Otaegui's opening 62, one of the highlights of the first round was the cameraman's comedy fall during a mid round interview with Marc Warren. He managed to stay on his feet on Friday, though.
When you make it through an in-round interview without falling over 🙌#AXAScottishChamps pic.twitter.com/y8PXcWDyZc
— The European Tour (@EuropeanTour) October 16, 2020
Otaegui battles hard
As is often the case when a player runs away from the rest of the field on day one, Otaegui struggled in the early stages of his second round but he hung in there, making some good par saves before recovering well on the back nine. Three birdies in his last six holes took him level with Wallace at the summit as he followed up Thursday's 62 with a second round 70.
